Thread: live communication between 2 c++ programs

Hi, I am looking for a good, fast method for communication between two c++ programs. I am making a 3D mouse pointer and need to send the three coordinates to another program that presents them graphically. At the moment I am using a file, but opening and closing a little file up to 40 times per second cant be ideal...
At the moment it looks like this:

Code to send coordinates in Prog1:

Code:

ofstream fout("c:\\xyz.txt");
fout << x << " " << y << " " << z;
fout << flush;
fout.close();

(x, y, z are doubles)

Code to recieve coordinates in Prog2:

Code:

		
ifstream fin("c:\\xyz.txt");
		
if(fin.good())
{
       fin >> X >> Y >> Z;
}
	
fin.close();

Any better ideas?
My googling before finding this forum suggested me sockets or pipes, but I cant get it working. Any example is welcome!

Thanks!!
/Tomas B

EDIT: I am using Windows XP and Visual Studio 2005

http://msdn2.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa363858.aspx
Scroll down to the end, then read about mailslots and pipes.

http://cboard.cprogramming.com/showthread.php?t=88163