Protocols/MSNP/Activities/SDK/Techref/Testing/Introduction
Testing Overview
After developing an MSN® Messenger Activity, you will want to test it to be sure it behaves the way you want it to. To test your application, you must copy the file MSGRP2P.XML to the correct location. (The Local XML File topic contains an example of this file.) The file should be copied to the same directory where the MSN Messenger client executable is installed.
Note: Submission of your XML file to the MSN Messenger Support team is a requirement of the compliance process.
Copying the MSGRP2P.xmlfile on one computer is enough to test a single-user application. If the application to be tested is for more than one player, then the same file must be copied on more than one machine. One computer is used to send an invitation, and the other can receive and accept the invitation.
When Messenger starts, it checks to see whether the file MSGRP2P.xml exists and whether it contains an Acitivity entry that is in the proper format. If the entry exists and is well formed, Messenger adds a menu item called Start (Name), where (Name) is defined by the Name element in the MSGRP2P.xml file. The item is added to the Actions menu of the Messenger Conversation window. When the user selects this menu item and clicks past a warning dialog box, Messenger launches the single-user application. If the application is for multiple players, an invitation is sent to the remote user to launch the application described by the MSGRP2P.xml file.
When an invitation is received to launch the application defined by MSGRP2P.xml, the receiving instance of Messenger checks to see whether the MSGRP2P.xml file is present on the local machine. If the file is present, Messenger also checks to see whether the local file describes an application that has the same name as the one sent with the invitation.
If the MSGRP2P.xml file exists on both machines, and if the name of the application is the same in both files, the invitation can be accepted on the remote computer, and the application will be launched on both computers.
If MSGRP2P.xml is missing from the inviter's machine, the invitation will not be sent. If MSGRP2P.xml is missing from the recipient's machine, the invitation will automatically be declined. If the application name contained within the MSGRP2P.xml does not match in both instances of the XML file, the invitation will automatically be declined.
MSGRP2P.xml contains precisely the same XML that would be fetched from Messenger's Web servers if the application were published in the Activity directory, except that it uses a special ID that is reserved for testing purposes. Developers should edit the file to specify the name and URL of their application before copying the file to their test machines.