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Re: Ye say it's binary data ye be wantin'?
IDL / NDR is part of OSF / DCE. Its chief advantage is that it maps
very efficiently and directly to C / C++. It's a big parsing job to
generate C structs from ASN.1 source. It's trivial in IDL -- often,
the IDL source and the application source in C can share header file texts.
I believe that OSF / DCE is an ISO standard, but I don't know the
number. IDL is in the public domain. I think the rest of DCE is, also.
You can get to IDL from www.osf.org, tho' the spec is pretty deep off
that home page.
(6rian)
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From: "Donald E. Eastlake 3rd" <dee@cybercash.com>
To: Rich Salz <rsalz@osf.org>
Cc: <spki@c2.org>
Subject: Re: Ye say it's binary data ye be wantin'?
Date: Saturday, February 24, 1996 10:24AM
There is no need for an abstract synatax notation. The IETF standardized
bits on the wire so something that does not produce concrete is useless.
So is the documentation for IDL and its coding available on line? Is it
better than XDR [RFC 1832] and if so why?
Even if its concrete and better than XDR and perfectly open and available
on line it is not at all clear to me that anything so elaborate is needed.
Donald
On Fri, 23 Feb 1996, Rich Salz wrote:
> Date: Fri, 23 Feb 1996 20:47:37 -0500
> From: Rich Salz <rsalz@osf.org>
> To: spki@c2.org
> Subject: Ye say it's binary data ye be wantin'?
>
> Thanks to Perry for reminding me to send this here...
>
> > I have made this offer before.
> >
> > If the IETF wants a C-like abstraact notation with efficient coding
> > rules and free source, ... and it's an ISO standard already, OSF is
> > happy to help with DCE IDL, the free IDL compiler, and a copyright-
> > free vresion of the specification that defines the bits on the wire.
> > /r$
> >
>
>
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