The Free On-line Dictionary of Computing (30 December 2018):

Interface Definition Language

   (IDL) 1. An OSF standard for defining RPC stubs.

   [Details?]

   2. Part of an effort by Project DOE at SunSoft, Inc.  to
   integrate distributed object technology into the Solaris
   operating system.  IDL provides the standard interface
   between objects, and is the base mechanism for object
   interaction.

   The Object Management Group's CORBA 1.1 (Common Object
   Request Broker Architecture) specifies the interface between
   objects.  IDL (Interface Definition Language) is the base
   mechanism for object interaction.

   The SunSoft OMG IDL CFE (Compiler Front End) version 1.2
   provides a complete framework for building CORBA 1.1-compliant
   preprocessors for OMG IDL.  To use it you write a back-end.  A
   complete compiler of IDL would translate IDL into client
   side and server side routines for remote communication in
   the same manner as Sun's current RPCL compiler.  The IDL
   compiler front end allows integration of new back ends which
   can translate IDL to various programming languages.

   Several companies including Sunsoft are building back ends to
   the CFE which translate IDL into target languages,
   e.g. Pascal or C++, in the context of planned
   CORBA-compliant products.  IDL requires C++ 2.1.

   Not to be confused with any of the other IDLs.

   E-mail: .

   (ftp://omg.org/pub/omg_idl_cfe.tar.Z),
   (ftp://omg.org/pub/OMG_IDL_CFE_1.2/).

   Telephone: Mache Creeger, SunSoft, Inc. +1 (415) 336 5884.

   (1993-05-04)