Parametric exchange of data between a modeling system and an external application program

In a computer system having a computer-aided design (CAD) program for manipulating a model of an object, a method, comprising the steps of:

• registering an external application program (EAP) with a CAD program, the registration registering a callback that is called from the CAD program to access the EAP;
• exporting data from a CAD model in the CAD program to an EAP, the EAP located in a separate address space from the CAD program;
• using the exported data as input data to execute the EAP and obtain output data from the EAP;
• importing the output data into the CAD program from the EAP;
• integrating the output data into the CAD model such that future changes to the model require additional calculations to be performed by the EAP;
• modifying the CAD model;
• determining programmatically without user input that the modifications to the model require new output data from the EAP;
• in response to the determination that the modifications to the model require new output data from the EAP, programmatically calling the EAP without user input and passing new input data to the EAP, the new input data generated from the modification of the model, the new input data used by the EAP to generate updated output data;
• and
• automatically integrating the updated output data into the CAD model without a user request.

A computer-aided design (CAD) system, comprising:

• a CAD program;
• an external application program (EAP) that is located in a separate address space from the CAD program;
• a model of an object that contains output data from the EAP integrated into the model such that future changes to the model are programmatically determined without user input to require additional calculations to be performed by the EAP;
• and
• a registration facility for registering a callback for the EAP with the CAD program so that the CAD program calls the EAP when the output data from the EAP in the model needs updating as a result of changes to the model.

In a computer system running an external application program (EAP) and a computer-aided design (CAD) package with a model of an object that includes output data from the EAP, a computer-readable medium holding computer-executable instructions for performing a method, comprising the computer-implemented steps of:

• registering the EAP with the CAD package, the registration registering a callback to the EAP from the CAD package;
• modifying the model;
• determining programmatically without user input that the modifying of the model requires recalculation of the output data from the EAP, the EAP located in a separate address space from the CAD package;
• and in response to the determining, sending new input data to the EAP and obtaining new output data from the EAP.

In a computer system having a computer-aided design (CAD) package program for manipulating a model of an object, a computer-readable medium holding computer-executable instructions for performing a method, comprising the computer-implemented steps of:

• registering an external application program (EAP) with a CAD program, the registration registering a callback that is called from the CAD program to access the EAP;
• importing output data into the CAD program from an external application program (EAP), the EAP located in a separate address space from the CAD program;
• integrating the output data into the model such that future changes to the model require additional calculations to be performed by the EAP;
• modifying the model;
• determining programmatically without user input that the modifying of the model requires recalculation of the output data from the EAP;
• and
• automatically updating the output data by calling the EAP with new input data without a user request.