Software Applications, Components and Libraries
SocketTools Overview
SocketTools is a collection of components designed to help developers create Internet-enabled applications quickly and easily, without sacrificing flexibility or performance. Because SocketTools includes a large number of components and has several editions, we thought it would be helpful to provide an overview of the SocketTools family of products. This will give you a better general understanding of what SocketTools is, and which product will best suit your needs. We recommend using our Product Wizard, which will help you select the best SocketTools Edition for your project, based on your development needs.
There are four standard SocketTools editions, each designed to meet the needs of specific types of development projects:
SocketTools .NET Edition
The SocketTools .NET Edition consists of managed code classes for use with
the .NET Framework. These classes
are compatible
with Visual Studio 2008, Visual Studio 2005 and Visual Studio .NET 2003, as well
as Borland Developer Studio 2006 on Windows 2000
and later platforms. The class interfaces are very similar to the
ActiveX control interfaces in the Visual Edition, making it easy to
migrate legacy applications that used the SocketTools controls to
the .NET platform. It is important to note that the .NET Edition
classes are managed code components written in C# and are not
compatible with older development tools such as Visual Basic 6.0.
» Learn More
SocketTools Library Edition
The SocketTools Library Edition consists of standard dynamic link
libraries (DLLs) and can be used in a wide variety of programming
languages. Because most programming languages support calling
functions exported from a DLL, the Library Edition provides the
broadest compatibility with the various development tools available
for the Windows platform. The Library Edition is ideal for languages
such as Visual C++ and C++ Builder as well as a number of other
languages such as Delphi and PowerBASIC. Complete interop function
declarations and constants are also included for Visual Basic .NET,
Visual C# and Visual J#
» Learn More
SocketTools Scripting Edition
The SocketTools Scripting Edition consists of Component Object
Model (COM) libraries designed primarily for use in scripting
languages such as VBScript and JScript. While the interface to the
Scripting Edition components is similar to the ActiveX controls in
the Visual Edition, the internal design has significant differences.
The Scripting Edition components do not have the inherent overhead
of ActiveX controls and they implement a threading model that makes
them much more efficient to use with Active Server Pages (ASP) and
similar environments.
» Learn More
SocketTools Visual Edition
The SocketTools Visual Edition consists of ActiveX controls which
are designed to be used with Visual Basic, Visual FoxPro,
PowerBuilder and other Rapid Application Development programming
languages. The Visual Edition components can also be used with
Visual Studio.NET, Visual C++ or any other language that supports
the use of ActiveX controls.
» Learn More
In addition to the standard SocketTools Editions, each has a corresponding Secure Edition which enables the developer to take advantage of secure communication over the Internet using the standard Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) and Transport Layer Security (TLS) protocols. This is the same 128-bit encryption standard used by commercial applications to ensure the strongest level of security over the Internet. The SocketTools Secure Editions can be used to connect to secure web, file and mail servers around the world.
For a comparison of the various SocketTools Editions and their features, please review the SocketTools Features spreadsheet.
SocketTools Edition
SocketTools Links
Product Wizard
Decide which SocketTools Edition best meets your needs.
SocketTools 6.0
Read about what is new in the latest version of SocketTools.
SocketTools Overview
An overview of the SocketTools editions, features and benefits.
SocketTools Features
Additional information about the product features.
Design Concepts
Design concepts for the SocketTools product suite.
Frequently Asked Questions
Answers to the most common questions about SocketTools.
Release Notes
Release notes for the current version of SocketTools.
License Agreement
The developer license agreement for this product.