An architectural overview of the ACE framework: a case study of successful cross-platform systems software reuse
Douglas C. Schmidt · ;login:: the magazine of USENIX & SAGE · 1999
This article describes the software architecture of ACE [1], which is a freely available, open source C++ framework targeted for developers of high-performance and real-time communication services and applications. The ACE framework provides an integrated set of components that help developers navigate between the “Scylla and Charybdis” limitations of (1) low-level native OS APIs, which are inflexible and non-portable and (2) higher-level distributed object computing middleware, which are often inefficient and unreliable. This article describes the structure and functionality of ACE, outlines several complex communication middleware applications that have been developed with ACE, and summarizes the key lessons learned developing and deploying reusable the OO communication software components and frameworks in ACE. 2 Overview of ACE