VMS Help DCE_RPC, API Runtime Intro, General Information  *Conan The Librarian (sorry for the slow response - running on an old VAX)

   The following subsections contain topics, beyond those directly
   related to the RPC API, that application programmers need to know.

   IDL-to-C Mappings

     The Interface Definition Language (IDL) compiler converts an
     interface definition into output files.  The rpc_intro reference
     page in the OSF DCE Command Reference contains a summary of the
     idl command, which invokes the IDL compiler.

     Additional information about the IDL compiler appears in the
     following table, which shows the IDL base types and the IDL-to-C
     mappings.  The following table lists the IDL base data type
     specifiers.  Where applicable, the table shows the size of the
     corresponding transmittable type and the type macro emitted by
     the IDL compiler for resulting declarations.

                    Base Data Type Specifiers - rpc_intro
            ___________________________________________________________
                       Specifier                        Type Macro
             (sign)     (size)     (type)     Size      Emitted by idl
            ___________________________________________________________
                         small     int        8 bits    idl_small_int
                         short     int        16 bits   idl_short_int
                         long      int        32 bits   idl_long_int
                         hyper     int        64 bits   idl_hyper_int
            unsigned     small     int        8 bits    idl_usmall_int
            unsigned     short     int        16 bits   idl_ushort_int
            unsigned     long      int        32 bits   idl_ulong_int
            unsigned     hyper     int        64 bits   idl_uhyper_int
                                   float      32 bits   idl_short_float
                                   double     64 bits   idl_long_float
                                   char       8 bits    idl_char
                                   boolean    8 bits    idl_boolean
                                   byte       8 bits    idl_byte
                                   void       -         idl_void_p_t
                                   handle_t   -         -

     Note that you can use the idl_ macros in the code you write for an
     application to ensure that your type declarations are consistent
     with those in the stubs, even when the application is ported to
     another platform.   The idl_  macros are especially useful when
     passing constant values to RPC calls.  For maximum portability,
     all constants passed to RPC calls declared in your network
     interfaces should be cast to the appropriate type because the size
     of integer constants (like the size of the int data type) is
     unspecified in the C language.  The idl_ macros are defined in
     SYS$COMMON:[DCE$LIBRARY]IDLBASE.H, which is included by header
     files that the IDL compiler generates.

   Management Commands for Programmers

     In addition to the idl command for  programmers,  DCE RPC provides
     two management commands for the RPC control program and the DCE
     Host daemon, as follows:

       + The rpccp control program accesses RPCCP, the RPC control
         program.  This program provides a set of commands for
         accessing the operations of the RPC Name Service Interface
         (NSI operations).  RPCCP also supports showing the elements
         of the local endpoint map and removing elements from it.

       You can manage the name service with RPCCP commands or with DCE
       RPC runtime routines.  For example, suppose you want to obtain
       the members of a group.  You can give the show group command to
       RPCCP or you can write an application program that calls the
       following DCE RPC runtime routines:

            - rpc_ns_group_mbr_inq_begin()

            - rpc_ns_group_mbr_inq_next()

            - rpc_ns_group_mbr_inq_done()

       + The dced command starts the DCE Host daemon.  The daemon
         maintains the local endpoint map for RPC servers and looks
         up endpoints for RPC clients.

   See the OSF DCE Administration Reference for more information about
   these two management commands.