OSF Standards for RPC

The design and technology behind Microsoft RPC is just one part of a complete environment for distributed computing defined by the Open Software Foundation (OSF), a consortium of companies formed to define that environment. The OSF requests proposals for standards, accepts comments on the proposals, votes on whether to accept the standards, and then promulgates them. The components of the OSF distributed computing environment (DCE) are shown in the following figure.

In selecting the RPC standard, the OSF cited the following rationale:

• The three most important properties of a remote procedure call are simplicity, transparency, and performance.
• The selected RPC model adheres to the local procedure model as closely as possible. This requirement minimizes the amount of time developers spend learning the new environment.
• The selected RPC model permits interoperability; its core protocol is well defined and cannot be modified by the user.
• The selected RPC model allows applications to remain independent of the transport and protocol on which they run, while supporting a variety of transports and protocols.
• The selected RPC model can be easily integrated with other components of the DCE.

The OSF-DCE remote procedure call standards define not only the overall approach, but the language and the specific protocols to use for communications between computers as well, down to the format of data as it is transmitted over the network.

Microsoft's implementation of RPC is compatible with the OSF standard with the exception of some minor differences. Client or server applications written using Microsoft RPC will interoperate with any DCE RPC client or server whose run-time libraries run over a supported protocol. For a list of supported protocols, see Building RPC Applications.