IBM Corp’s notion of tossing Common Object Request Broker Architecture-to-Common Object Model interoperability into the CORBA 2.0 pot was thrown out as fast as it could be tabled at the Nashua, New Hampshire meeting last week. The Object Management Group task force delegates wanted the Microsoft Corp issue kept separate from an already embittered submission process. Therefore, as anticipated, the issue of interoperability will be addressed by a Request for Proposals due to be issued at the Object Group’s next get together. Ironically, the creators of the draft Request were Digital Equipment Corp, IBM and Microsoft. With, in its estimation, an ideological threshold now breached with CORBA 2.0, the Object Group anticipates the Common Object Request Broker Architecture-to-Common Object Model specification process will be a far less tortuous affair. It envisages three or four proposals being merged into a ‘classic’ single submission. The Universal Networked Objects group says that its mechanism is already appropriate to build Common Object Model interoperability from, and will form one or more of the proposals. Others products from the Microsoft camp are also expected in the future.
