Integrating IBM Personal Communications for Windows with Microsoft Office

Question

Hello,
I am a self taught programmer and I use COM objects to integrate IBM Personal Communications with Microsoft Office.   VBScript is used to perform internal automations of the IBM product as well as integrate it with Outlook and Excel. 
Instead of buying an e-mail product for the AS/400, I just have Personal Communications send e-mail from Outlook.  Instead of creating a spreadsheet application in Java, I integrate Excel with Personal Communications. 
Having a Technet section that showcases integrating Microsoft products with Personal Communications to enhance it would be desirable. Any ActiveX examples in Personal Communications have to be re-engineered to work with VBScript because they are coded in Visual Basic.
For example, VBScript can be used with Personal Communications; but, Visual Basic is used with Microsoft Office applications. 
Because Personal Communications has limited windows interfaces, I use HTML applications to create more feature rich windows interfaces with Personal Communications when I want more complexity than either an input or a message box from VBScript.
Although HTML applications are old technology, they are easy to create and can utilize all the functionality of MSIE to use VBScript, Javascript, C#, Java, HTML, DHTML, and CSS.  However, I generally only need VBScript, HTML and CSS.
MSDN2 has HTML applications, CSS, and VBScript in separate sections; but, it does not have a section that shows how everything can be used together. 
Have a great Day!
Jesse Grune. 
 Jesse Grune

Answer 1

  Anything can be hacked; however, when I want to get a job done fast I write my own automation and execute it instead of filing a request for IT to write an interal system upgrade.
For example, say I want to have my computer talk for me because I cannot talk at the moment. What I can do is use the speech capabilty of Microsoft Excel and add it as a feature of an automation. 
[PCOMM SCRIPT HEADER]
LANGUAGE=VBSCRIPT
DESCRIPTION=Have the computer talk
[PCOMM SCRIPT SOURCE]
OPTION EXPLICIT
autECLSession.SetConnectionByName(ThisSessionName)
REM This line calls the macro subroutine
subSub1_
Sub subSub1_()
dim myexcel
Set myexcel=CreateObject("Excel.Application")
dim string
string = Inputbox("What do you want to say?")
                    myexcel.Application.Visible = False
                    myexcel.Speech.Speak string
                    autECLSession.autECLPS.SendKeys "[reset]"
                    set myexcel = Nothing
          End Sub
If I want it to read the page to me, I can have it copy a section of a screen or set of screens and then read the data to me.  Also, I use a slight modification of the above code to allow me to write to an Excel file for hidden or visible tracking of what an associate is doing. The hidden tracking is for supervisor or managerial back end review.
If I want to send e-mail, I Include the following code in a VBScript automation file:
         dim myOLItem, Mail
         set Mail = CreateObject ("Outlook.Application")        
         Set myOLItem = Mail.CreateItem(0)
         myOLItem.To = "Some e-mail in quotes"
        myOLItem.CC = "Some other e-mail in quotes"
        myOLItem.Subject = "A subject in quotes"     
        myOLItem.Body =   "The message body in quotes"
        myOLItem.Display
Using CreateObject, I am able to use features of almost any progam on my desktop and have them as features in my automation.  Aslo, I can borrow features of other programming languages on my computer and use them in VBscript.
If I wanted to add some level of security to my scripts I could have a check file that verifies my automations are secure; but, that would be a pain to maintain unless I add artificial intelligence to the program. 
Because of security features in Outlook, I directly type my closing rather than pull my name as the current user because I don't want to bother with the popup box that my automation is hacking my address book. 
There are some programs at work that data is typed into from the Client Access Emulator; and, if I had the time to scrpt code and the obect model of the program, I could automate that work and put a lot of people out of work.    
Anyone that can write up cooking directions and follow them, can write a program. Debugging the program to work with a compiler or the quirks of another program from which the automation is being executed is similar to modifying a recipe depending on the cooking conditions.
Have a great Day!
Jesse Grune.
Jesse Grune