From JVM to Bean to ActiveX to VB

Question

Hello.
I have to find a solution to access methods from Visual Basic. The aim is that i call in Excel:
=TestClass_ReturnData("Jan").
TestClass is a java class
ReturnData is a method, which require a string and deliver a string.
I found a solution with JIntegra from linear and this works great, but it is commercial.
After an experimental phase with JNI....,i found no way for my problem to solve it with JNI, now i have a new idea:-)
What do you think about this design:
-a bean communicate with a class (the class is runing in JVM)
-the bean is transformed with JavaBeansBridge for ActiveX and registered as a COM
-and now (i hope) i can communicate with the COM in VB
-finish (access from excel to vb is simple)
My first Question:
Is there an easier,free way to do my task
Second:Am i total stupid and my desing can never work
Hope you can help me, i work for over one week now on my task and i think i make no really step to solve it
With friendly regards
tom
p.s. sorry for my english, hope you can understand what i mean ;-)

Answer 1

I had to do something like this before. This is the solution I used, it may not be the fastest however. I had to ensure that the calling object was platform independent, but the objects calling excel were platform dependent.
Create your VB application to call whatever methods you want in excel. Create a RMI server in Visual J++ (yes I know!!!), you can then simply add a COM wrapper to your VB application and call the methods directly.
Write a client that calls the RMI server and can therefore indirectly access Excel.
I know it's a bit long winded but it works quite well and the client can still be platform independent!