Building component software with COM and Eiffel

Component development is a rapidly growing field in modern computer systems construction. Components represent one further step in reusability; from source reuse with object-oriented principles to binary reuse. Achieving binary reusability implies the creation of standards that all the components of the same system must observe. One of the leading standards is Microsoft's Component Object Model (COM). COM is an object-based technology but doesn't use the standard object-oriented paradigms due to its binary nature. This new approach involves a new design and also some pitfalls. The paper considers COM as a means to achieve communication between component and presents the enhancements that a language such as Eiffel can add to the development of a COM aware application. These advantages proceed from a combination of the true object-oriented nature of Eiffel and COM's object-based approach. They lead to better and easier design.