An Overview of CORBA 3
Jon Siegel · 1999
Already the architecture of choice for distributed enterprise applications, CORBA takes a major step in capability and ease-of-use with the addition of new features labeled, collectively, CORBA 3. The new abilities group into three areas:Java and Internet Integration: Two URL formats for the CORBA object reference provide access to CORBA services and objects over the internet or on remote hosts in your enterprise.A Java-to-IDL mapping automatically defines IDL interfaces for objects programmed in Java.A binary stub standard removes a possible barrier to portability.And, a Firewall specification enhances enterprise access to CORBA over the internet.Quality of Service Management: An enhancement to OMG's standard nop protocol brings the reliability and flexibility of messaging to your CORBA installation.Asynchronous invocation modes can now be used with stub-based invocations.Quality of Service can be specified for both synchronous and asynchronous invocations, in a number of ways.Minimal CORBA (for embedded systems), realtime CORBA, and fault-tolerant CORBA specifications are either complete or nearly so.Distributed Components: Perhaps the most exciting of the new developments, the CORBAcomponents specification defines a container which packages the capabilities that enterprise applications rely upon: persistence, transactionality, security, and event handling.Compatible with Enterprise Java Beans, the system extends component technology to C++ and the other CORBA programming languages.Also provided are interface navigation, connection of interfaces supplied and required by the components in an assembly, and a multi-platform software distribution format and installer which enable a CORBA component marketplace.