Using external applications to extend RPG Maker's functionality

I've written an article discussing how we can use external applications to read output from RPG Maker and process it.


You can read it here.





Basically, you can send stuff to an external application that listens to the game. I don't know much about IPC so this is what I got out of articles on forking and stuff.


A demo is included as well as the source code for the external application (written in C#).


If anyone knows how to send data back INTO RM and have RM read it and process it, that might be interesting.


Things that we could potentially do:


-support net capabilities without having to write any of it ourselves


-read and write from excel files or google spreadsheet


-work with databases without having to write our own drivers.


Basically, avoid re-inventing the wheel just for RPG Maker.


Of course, if you want to go mobile or any other platform, this would likely just introduce an extra layer of complications.