OMG Announces CORBA/e Middleware Specification for Distributed Real-time & Embedded Systems.

NEEDHAM, Mass. -- First two adopted profiles, CORBA/e Compact Profile and CORBA/e Micro Profile, target resource-constrained embedded systems

The Object Management Group(TM) (OMG(TM)), today announced the adoption of CORBA/e (CORBA(R) for embedded) as a standard. Drawing on more than 16 years of experience with the CORBA middleware, OMG has designed CORBA/e to have the best of both worlds: dramatically minimizing the footprint and overhead of typical middleware, while retaining the core elements of interoperability and real-time computing that support optimized distributed systems. Also announced today are the first two CORBA/e profiles, CORBA/e Compact and CORBA/e Micro Profile. Tailored separately for minimal and single-chip environments, the Compact Profile and the Micro Profile bring industry-standard interoperability and real-time predictable behavior to Distributed Real-time and Embedded (DRE) computing.

CORBA is a mature, standard middleware that combines the interoperability, deterministic execution, and absolute dependability required by distributed embedded systems. CORBA standardizes the interoperability, and Real-time CORBA defines the deterministic execution platform that these systems need, but the full versions of these specifications were designed for a resource-rich, dynamic environment. To adapt these specifications to the resource-constrained, static embedded environment, OMG developed CORBA/e. CORBA/e sheds the dynamic and high-resource aspects of CORBA (such as the Dynamic Invocation Interface, Interface Repository, and Components) while retaining full interoperability and (for the Compact Profile) the real-time infrastructure including static scheduling.

"Constrained by memory limitations, performance requirements, and physical and cost considerations, each embedded system design requires a middleware platform tailored precisely to its needs - unused features occupy precious memory space, while missing capabilities must be tacked on," said Dr. Richard Soley, chairman & CEO, OMG. "By providing a family of CORBA/e profiles, OMG lets embedded-system designers select the one with exactly the capabilities they need in a middleware platform, without burdening them with features they don't need."

"For more than a decade, IONA has been a leader in the CORBA market and we view the introduction of CORBA/e as a significant milestone in the evolution of this important industry standard," said Neil Kenealy, senior product manager, IONA. "For our customers that want to extend their existing enterprise CORBA systems to take advantage of new embedded applications, CORBA/e offers the benefit of seamless integration, helping them to achieve a greater return on their CORBA investments."

"CORBA/e allows developers to achieve the ultra-fast performance required for distributed real-time and embedded applications. From resource-constrained devices requiring small footprints to large-scale systems in military/aerospace, telecommunications, industrial process control, robotics and more, CORBA/e is designed to meet even the most demanding requirements of performance-based embedded applications without forfeiting the interoperability, portability, and platform independence that CORBA has built its reputation on," said Joe Jacob, senior vice president, Objective Interface Systems, Inc. "As editor of the CORBA/e standard, we have been privileged to be involved in an open standard that represents the next generation of CORBA."

"PrismTech applauds the OMG's CORBA/e initiative, with its support for multiple embedded profiles such as the Micro and Compact profiles and with the ability to add additional domain specific profiles as CORBA/e evolves in the future. We believe that CORBA/e ORBs will be accepted as the key middleware technology even in the most resource constrained embedded systems such as those found in DSP and micro-controller environments," said Keith Steele, CEO, PrismTech.

CORBA/e Compact Profile

CORBA/e Compact Profile merges key features of standard CORBA suitable for resource-constrained static systems (no DII, DSI, Interface Repository, or Component support) and Real-time CORBA into a powerful yet compact middleware package that interoperates with other CORBA clients and servers of every scale, executes with the deterministic characteristics required of a true real-time platform, and leverages the knowledge and skills of your existing development team through its mature industry-standard architecture.

CORBA/e Micro Profile

The CORBA/e Micro Profile shrinks the footprint even more, small enough to fit low-powered microprocessors or digital signal processors (DSPs). This profile further eliminates the Valuetype, the Any type, most of the POA options preserved in the Compact Profile, and all of the Real-time functions excepting only the Mutex interface. In exchange for these limitations, the profile defines a CORBA executable that vendors have fit into only tens of kilobytes - small enough to fit onto a high-end DSP or microprocessor on a hand-held device.

Technical Features

CORBA/e Compact Profile:

    --  Compact yet powerful: Fits resource-constrained systems
        (32-bit processor running a RTOS), but supports sophisticated
        applications such as signal or image processing in Real-time.

    --  Interoperable:

        --  Compiles all OMG IDL (although dynamic aspects of CORBA -
            IFR, DII, DSI, recursive Valuetypes, dynamic Any - do not
            execute).

        --  Integrates with applications running full CORBA, CORBA/i,
            CORBA/e Compact Profile, and CORBA/e Micro Profile.

        --  Supports native IIOP (all versions through the current
            GIOP 1.4 and IIOP 1.4).

    --  Deterministic:

        --  Supports Real-time CORBA with Static Scheduling;

        --  Propagates Real-time CORBA priorities over the wire.

        --  Disallows dynamic aspects of CORBA - IFR, DII, DSI,
            dynamic Any, recursive Valuetypes.

    --  Server-side: POA Supporting Transient or Persistent objects;
        Retained servants (disallows Implicit Activation); Prioritized
        multi-threading under ORB control. Does not support CORBA
        Components.

    --  Complete: Includes Naming, Events, and Lightweight Logging
        Services.

    CORBA/e Micro Profile:

    --  Truly Micro: Fits on a mobile or similar device with a
        low-power microprocessor, or high-end DSP.

    --  Interoperable:

        --  Compiles all OMG IDL (Dynamic aspects of CORBA - IFR, DII,
            DSI, Any, Valuetypes, transient Servants - do not
            execute).

        --  Integrates with applications running full CORBA, CORBA/i,
            CORBA/e Compact Profile, and CORBA/e Micro Profile.

        --  Supports native IIOP (all versions through the current
            GIOP 1.4 and IIOP 1.4).

    --  Deterministic:

        --  Supports only statically defined Interfaces, Interactions,
            and Scheduling.

        --  Supports Real-time CORBA MUTEX interfaces.

    --  Server-side: For compactness and deterministic behavior,
        supports exactly one POA; allows only transient, retained
        servants with unique, system-assigned IDs; and multi-threading
        under ORB control.

For more information on CORBA/e or the CORBA/e Compact or CORBA/e Micro profiles, please visit http://www.omg.org/crb-e-pr/.

About The OMG

With well-established standards covering software from design and development, through deployment and maintenance, and extending to evolution to future platforms, the Object Management Group (OMG) supports a full-lifecycle approach to enterprise integration which maximizes ROI, the key to successful IT. OMG's Modeling standards, the basis for the MDA(R), include the Unified Modeling Language(TM) (UML(R)) and Common Warehouse Metamodel (CWM(TM)). CORBA, the Common Object Request Broker Architecture, is OMG's standard open platform with hundreds of millions of deployments running today. Headquartered in Needham, MA, USA, the Object Management Group is an international, open membership, not-for-profit computer industry specifications consortium. More information about OMG can be found at www.omg.org.

Note to editors: MDA, Model Driven Architecture, OMG Logo, UML, UML logo and CORBA are registered trademarks, and OMG, Object Management Group, MOF, MDA Logos, and Unified Modeling Language are trademarks, of Object Management Group. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.