What we have actually done in the last section is to implement some very simple kind of naming service on top of the file system. A naming service is a mapping between names and addresses which allows you to look up the address for a given name. For example a phone directory is a naming service: it maps people's names to phone numbers.
In the CORBA context a naming service maps names to object references. The simple naming service we implemented in the previous section maps file names to stringified object references. The OMG has defined a more elaborate naming service as a set of CORBA objects, an implementation of which is now shipped with MICO. To use the name service you have to
nsd
nsd using the
-ORBNamingAddr option (see section 4.1.1
for details)
There is a program called nsadmin that can be used to browse
and change the contents of the naming service. The demo/naming
directory contains an example how to use the name service.