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Systems Management: Common Management Facilities (XCMF)
Copyright © 1997 The Open Group
Glossary
activation
Preparing an object to execute an operation. For example, copying the
persistent form of methods and stored data into an executable address space
to allow execution of the methods on the stored data.
adapter
Same as object adapter.
attribute
An identifiable association between an
object and a value. An attribute
is made visible to clients as a pair of operations:
and
Read-only attributes only generate a
operation.
behaviour
The observable effects of an object performing
the requested operation including its results.
client
The code or process that invokes an operation on an object.
context
A collection of name-value pairs that provides environmental or
user-preference information.
CORBA
Common Object Request Broker Architecture.
COS
Common Object Services. See reference COS Volume 1.
COSS
Common Object Services Specification. See reference COS Volume 1.
data type
A categorization of values operation arguments, typically covering
both behaviour and representation (that is, the traditional
non-object-oriented programming language notion of type).
dynamic invocation
Constructing and issuing a request whose signature is possibly not
known until run time.
event
A state change of an object that causes the behaviour of an object.
factory object
An object that creates another object.
federation
The principle whereby each component retains its autonomy rather
than becoming subordinate to another.
implementation definition language
A notation for describing implementations. The implementation
definition language is currently beyond the scope of the ORB standard. It
may contain vendor-specific and adapter-specific notations.
implementation inheritance
The construction of an implementation by incremental
modification of other implementations. The ORB does not provide
implementation inheritance. Implementation inheritance may be provided by
higher level tools.
inheritance
The construction of a definition by incremental
modification of other definitions. See interface and implementation
inheritance.
instance
An object is an instance of an interface if it
provides the operations, signatures and semantics specified by that
interface. An object is an instance of an implementation if its behaviour is
provided by that implementation.
interface
A listing of the operations and attributes that an object provides.
This includes the signatures of the operations, and the types of
the attributes.
An interface definition ideally includes the semantics as well.
An object satisfies an interface if it can be specified as the
target object in each potential request described by the interface.
interface inheritance
The construction of an interface by incremental modification of
other interfaces.
The IDL language provides interface inheritance.
interface object
An object that serves to describe an interface.
Interface objects reside in an interface repository.
interface type
A type satisfied by any object that satisfies a particular
interface.
interoperability
The ability for two or more ORBs to
cooperate to deliver requests to the proper object. Interoperating ORBs
appear to a client to be a single ORB.
language binding
The means and conventions by which a programmer writing in a specific
programming language accesses ORB capabilities.
language mapping
Language binding.
life cycle object
An object whose interfaces are defined by the life cycle services,
specifically remove, copy and move.
method
An implementation of
an operation. Code that may be executed to perform a requested service.
Methods associated with an object may be structured into one or more
programs.
multiple inheritance
The construction of a definition by incremental modification of
more than one other definition.
name binding
A name-to-object association.
A name binding is always defined relative to a naming context.
object
A combination of state and a set of methods that
explicitly embodies an abstraction characterized by the behaviour of relevant
requests. An object is an instance of an implementation and an interface. An
object models a real-world entity, and it is implemented as a computational
entity that encapsulates state and operations (internally implemented as
data and methods) and responds to requestor services.
object reference
A value that
unambiguously identifies an object. Object references are never reused to
identify another object.
OMA
Object Management Architecture
OMG
Object Management Group
operation
A service that can
be requested. An operation has an associated signature, which may restrict
which actual parameters are valid.
ORB
Object Request Broker. Provides the
means by which clients make and receive requests and responses.
A persistent object exists until it is explicitly deleted.
relationship
Relationships allow semantics to be added to references between
objects.
For example, relationships allow one object to contain another.
Life cycle services must work in the presence of graphs of
related objects.
request
A client issues a request to cause a
service to be performed. A request consists of an operation and zero or more
actual parameters.
results
The information returned to the client,
which may include values as well as status information indicating that
exceptional conditions were raised in attempting to perform the requested
service.
server
A process implementing one or more operations on one or more objects.
signature
Defines the parameters of a given operation including their number order,
data types and passing mode; the results if any; and the possible outcome
(normal as opposed to exceptional) that might occur.
single inheritance
The construction of a definition by incremental modification of one
definition.
Contrast with multiple inheritance.
state
The time varying properties of an object that affect its behaviour.
stub
A local procedure
corresponding to a single operation that invokes that operation when
called.
typed event
An event for which an interface is defined in terms of IDL.
value
Any entity that may be a possible actual
parameter in a request. Values that serve to identify objects are called
object references.
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