Overview
ISO/IEC 10728:1993/Amd 4:1998 is an international standard amendment that introduces the Remote Procedure Call Interface Definition Language (RPC IDL) binding to the Information Resource Dictionary System (IRDS) Services Interface. Developed by ISO/IEC Joint Technical Committee 1 (JTC 1), this amendment enhances the accessibility and interoperability of IRDS repository facilities within distributed computing environments.
The amendment ensures that IRDS repository services are available through RPC, a popular communication protocol in open systems, by defining a language binding using the RPC IDL as described in the ISO/IEC 11578:1996 standard. This facilitates wider adoption of IRDS functionality across various programming languages and platforms supporting RPC.
Key Topics
- RPC IDL Binding: Defines a standardized RPC Interface Definition Language binding for IRDS services, enabling remote procedure calls to IRDS repositories.
- Expanded Accessibility: Increases the ability to access IRDS repository functionalities from any language or environment supporting RPC.
- Language and Data Type Mapping: Specifies mappings between SQL data types and RPC IDL data types, ensuring data integrity and compatibility during remote calls.
- Service Interface Definitions: Details interface functions such as opening sessions, creating and modifying IRDS objects, transaction controls (commit, rollback), cursor management, and diagnostics through RPC.
- Compliance and Integration: Built in accordance with programming guidelines from ISO/IEC TR 10182:1993, ensuring seamless integration into open distributed processing systems.
- Normative References: Integrates with the ISO/IEC 11578 standard for Open Systems Interconnection Remote Procedure Call.
Applications
- Distributed Database Systems: Allows distributed applications and tools to access and manipulate metadata stored in IRDS repositories over networks using standardized RPC calls.
- Software Tool Development: Facilitates the development of interoperable data management and modeling tools that require standardized access to information resource dictionaries.
- Enterprise Data Management: Supports enterprises in managing and exchanging metadata consistently across different platforms and programming environments.
- Open Systems Interconnection: Enhances IRDS’s role within open distributed processing frameworks, promoting vendor-neutral metadata services.
- Interoperability Enhancements: Broadens IRDS’s service interface to support RPC-based communication paradigms, hence supporting diverse system architectures and middleware.
Related Standards
- ISO/IEC 11578:1996 – Information technology - Open Systems Interconnection - Remote Procedure Call (RPC), essential for the RPC binding.
- ISO/IEC TR 10182:1993 – Programming guidelines for language bindings, providing foundational principles followed in this amendment.
- ISO/IEC 9075:1992 – Database Language SQL, referenced for SQL data type specifications aligned with IRDS data structures.
- ISO/IEC 10728:1993 – The base standard defining the IRDS Services Interface before this amendment.
This amendment, ISO/IEC 10728:1993/Amd 4:1998, is critical for organizations seeking standardized, robust, and language-agnostic access to IRDS functionality through RPC in heterogeneous IT environments. By adopting this standard, implementers ensure compatibility, maintainability, and scalability of information resource management systems within open distributed processing architectures.