[comp.os.misc] "Registry" info wanted

coms2146@waikato.ac.nz (06/13/90)

In a local class in operating systems, we are talking about what we call
a registry. This "registers" the various facilitys/services made available
by the OS, and possibly those of user programs as well. Any programs
which wants to use these facilitys has its calls replaced by the
linker/loader by registry calls. The registry determines if the program
can access these services or not, and if so lets them be used.

What I want to know is if anyone has seen/used any facility that acts
like this, or know of any references in the literature? I have heard that
there is a networking daemon on apollo systems that acts in a similar
matter, but that may be wrong.

Please respond directly, I'll summarise here if there is enough interest...

Alistair Veitch                      Phone: +64 071 562889 ext. 8768
Internet: coms2146@waikato.ac.nz	    +64 071 562388 (home)
SNAIL: Computer Science Dept, University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand

"There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it
so simple that there are *obviously* no deficiencies and the other way is to
make it so simple that there are no *obvious* deficiencies."
	- C.A.R. Hoare, 1980 Turing Award Lecture

rodger@violon.chorus.fr (Rodger Lea) (06/13/90)

In article <725.2676656c@waikato.ac.nz>, coms2146@waikato.ac.nz writes:
|> In a local class in operating systems, we are talking about what we call
|> a registry. This "registers" the various facilitys/services made available
|> by the OS, and possibly those of user programs as well. Any programs
|> which wants to use these facilitys has its calls replaced by the
|> linker/loader by registry calls. The registry determines if the program
|> can access these services or not, and if so lets them be used.
|> 
|> What I want to know is if anyone has seen/used any facility that acts
|> like this, or know of any references in the literature? I have heard that
|> there is a networking daemon on apollo systems that acts in a similar
|> matter, but that may be wrong.

The ANSA architecture defines a service similar to this, and a partial
implementation exists in a piece of software called the 'testbench'. They use
the notion of a Trader which is a repository for 'object interface
descriptions'.
This includes the traditional type interface (eg methods) plus a set of
attributes (akin to data-base attributes) that allows users programs to
post service descriptions and for other applications to interact with
the trader to get a 'handle' on those services. In the current implementation
this is carried out by traditional RPC techniques - stub generation etc, so
it's used much like a standard RPC package, however, the ANSA architecture
is just that - an architecture, so the more sophisticated approach (link/load)
would fit into the model.

ANSA is a european ESPRIT project (now called ISA), you can contact them with

	apm@ansa.co.uk




|> 
|> Please respond directly, I'll summarise here if there is enough interest...
|>

sorry, my mail bounced somewhere around the pacific ! :-)
 
rodge

ag@otter.hpl.hp.com (Ajay Gupta ) (06/14/90)

>/ otter:comp.os.misc / coms2146@waikato.ac.nz /  5:10 am  Jun 13, 1990 /
>In a local class in operating systems, we are talking about what we call
>a registry. This "registers" the various facilitys/services made available
>by the OS, and possibly those of user programs as well. Any programs
>which wants to use these facilitys has its calls replaced by the
>linker/loader by registry calls. The registry determines if the program
>can access these services or not, and if so lets them be used.
>
>What I want to know is if anyone has seen/used any facility that acts
>like this, or know of any references in the literature? I have heard that
>there is a networking daemon on apollo systems that acts in a similar
>matter, but that may be wrong.
>
>Please respond directly, I'll summarise here if there is enough interest...
>
>Alistair Veitch                      Phone: +64 071 562889 ext. 8768
>Internet: coms2146@waikato.ac.nz	    +64 071 562388 (home)
>SNAIL: Computer Science Dept, University of Waikato, Hamilton, New Zealand
>
>"There are two ways of constructing a software design: One way is to make it
>so simple that there are *obviously* no deficiencies and the other way is to
>make it so simple that there are no *obvious* deficiencies."
>	- C.A.R. Hoare, 1980 Turing Award Lecture
>----------