interprocess communication---Named pipes

1. Named pipes (Named Pipes)

is a simple inter-process communication (IPC) mechanism. A named pipe can be reliable bidirectional or unidirectional data communication between different processes on the same computer, or between different processes across a network of different computers.

Named pipes take advantage of the Microsoft Network provider (MSNP) redirector, so there is no need to involve details such as the underlying communication protocol. Named pipes are a mechanism designed around the Windows file system, using the Named pipe file system (Named pipe SYSTEM,NPFS) interface. As a result, both the client and the server can use standard WIN32 file system API functions such as ReadFile and WriteFile to send and receive data.

The naming specification for named Pipes follows the Universal Naming convention (UNC):

　　\\server\pipe[\path]\name

(1) where \\server specifies the name of a server, and if it is local, it is represented by \ \.

(2) \pipe is an immutable "hard-coded" string (case insensitive) that indicates that the file belongs to the NPFS

(3) [\path]\name uniquely identifies the name of a named pipe.

interprocess communication---Named pipes