rpc_intro(1) General Commands Manual rpc_intro(1)
NAME
rpc_intro - Introduction to the DCE RPC programmer commands
DESCRIPTION
DCE RPC provides the following programmer commands: The idl command invokes the Interface Definition Language (IDL) compiler to convert an
interface definition, written in IDL, to output files. The uuidgen command creates a UUID string that you assign to an object to uniquely
distinguish it from other objects.
See each command's reference page for further information.
IDL Base Data Types and IDL-to-C Type 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(1) |
+--------------------------------+---------+-----------------+
| 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 dce/idlbase.h, which is included by header files that the IDL compiler generates.
RELATED INFORMATION
Commands: idl(1), uuidgen(1).
Messages: .
Books: .
rpc_intro(1)