$FreeBSD: src/lib/libc/rpc/README,v 1.2 2001/03/19 12:49:50 alfred Exp $ PLEASE READ THE DISCLAIMER FILE. DO NOT CALL THE SUN MICROSYSTEMS SUPPORT LINE WITH QUESTIONS ON THIS RELEASE. THEY CANNOT ANSWER QUESTIONS ABOUT THIS UNSUPPORTED SOURCE RELEASE. TIRPCSRC 2.3 29 Aug 1994 This distribution contains SunSoft's implementation of transport-independent RPC (TI-RPC), External Data Representation (XDR), and various utilities and documentation. These libraries and programs form the base of Open Network Computing (ONC), and are derived directly from the Solaris 2.3 source. Previous releases of RPC Source based on SunOS 4.x were ported to 4.2BSD and used Sockets as the transport interface. These versions were transport-specific RPC (TS-RPC). TI-RPC is an enhanced version of TS-RPC that requires the UNIX System V Transport Layer Interface (TLI) or an equivalent X/Open Transport Interface (XTI). TI-RPC is on-the-wire compatible with the TS-RPC, which is supported by almost 70 vendors on all major operating systems. TS-RPC source code (RPCSRC 4.0) remains available from several internet sites. This release is a native source release, that is, it is compatible for building on Solaris 2.3. This release was built on Solaris 2.3 using SunPro SPARCompiler 2.0.1. Solaris 2.3 is based on System V, Release 4 (SVR4), and while this release should be mostly compatible with other SVR4 systems, some Solaris facilities that are assumed may not be available. In particular, this release uses the Makefile format supported by SparcCompiler 2.0.1. Second, the Secure RPC routines use the Solaris Name Service Switch to access public-key credential databases. This code will need to be ported if your system does not support the Name Service Switch. Finally, this release uses the synchronization interfaces of UI Threads to make certain interfaces thread-safe. These interfaces are found in libthread in Solaris 2.3 and later. Applications linked with this release's librpc must link with the United States domestic version of libcrypt in order to resolve the cbc_crypt() and ecb_crypt() functions. These routines are used with Secure RPC however all RPC programs that link with this release's librpc will need to link with the domestic libcrypt. Note that the Solaris 2.3 Encryption Kit is only available within the United States. (PLEASE NOTE: The RPC implementation found in Solaris 2.3's libnsl does *not* have this requirement; linking with libcrypt is only a requirement for the TIRPCSRC 2.3 version of librpc.) DOCUMENTATION NOTE The documentation found in the doc directory are derived from the Solaris 2.3 Network Interfaces Programming Guide. A small number of compile examples are given, and these use libnsl to link in the RPC library. This release builds the RPC library as librpc. To use this release's librpc, use the link command "-lrpc -lnsl -lcrypt". This links the application with TIRPCSRC 2.3's librpc for RPC routines, Solaris's libnsl for other networking functions, and libcrypt for the cbc_crypt() and ecb_crypt functions. WHY IS THIS RELEASE BEING DONE? This release is being distributed to make the Sun implementation of the ONC technologies available for reference and porting to non-Solaris platforms. The current release is a native source distribution, and provides services that are already available on Solaris 2.3 (such as the RPC headers, the RPC library in libnsl, rpcbind, rpcinfo, etc.). It is not our intention to replace these services. See the DISCLAIMER for further information about the legal status of this release. WHAT'S NEW IN THIS RELEASE: TIRPCSRC 2.3 The previous release was TIRPCSRC 2.0. 1. This release is based on Solaris 2.3. The previous release was based on Solaris 2.0. This release contains a siginificant number of bug fixes and other enhancements over TIRPCSRC 2.0. 2. The RPC library is thread safe for all client-side interfaces (clnt_create, clnt_call, etc.). The server-side interfaces (svc_create, svc_run, etc.) are not thread safe in this release. The server-side interfaces will be made thread safe in the next release of TIRPCSRC. Please see the manual pages for details about which interfaces are thread safe. 3. As part of the work to make the RPC library thread-safe, rpcgen has been enhanced to generate thread-safe RPC stubs (the -M option). Note that this modifies the call-signature for the stub functions; the procedure calling the RPC stub must now pass to the stub a pointer to an allocated structure where results will be placed by the stub. See the rpcgen manual page and the rpcgen Programming Guide for details. 4. The Remote Asynchronous Calls (RAC) library is now included. RAC was first introduced in TIRPCSRC 1.0, and was bundled with librpc. It is now a separate library. The asynchronous call model that RAC provides can be achieved by using threads for making client-side RPC calls. The ONC Technology group recommends using threads (where possible) to achieve asynchrony rather than RAC. See the rpc_rac(3n) manual page for details. ROADMAP The directory hierarchy is as follows: cmd/ Utilities cmd/rpcgen The RPC Language compiler (for .x files) cmd/rpcbind The RPC bindery and portmapper cmd/rpcinfo RPC bindery query utility cmd/keyserv The Secure RPC keyserver cmd/demo Some simple ONC demo services doc/ Postscript versions of ONC documentation head/ Header files head/rpcsvc RPCL (.x) specifications for various ONC services, and header files. lib/ Libraries lib/librpc The RPC and XDR library lib/librac The Remote Asynchronous Calls (RAC) library man/ Manual pages for the RPC library and utilities. uts/common/rpc RPC header files BUILD INSTRUCTIONS Prior to building the release, you must define the SRC environment variable to be the path to the top-level Makefile. For example, if /usr/src/tirpcsrc is where to top-level Makefile is located, execute this command prior to building the release: setenv SRC /usr/src/tirpcsrc (csh) or SRC=/usr/src/tirpcsrc; export SRC (sh) The sources in the lib directory depend on header files installed from head and uts/common/rpc, and the programs in the cmd directory depend on libraries from lib. Therefore, you should do a "make install" to build the release. The top-level Makefile builds the release. The "ROOT" macro defines where the headers and libraries are installed. The default for ROOT is "/proto". You may change this by either modifiying Makefile.master, or issuing the build command with a new definition for ROOT: make install ROOT=/opt/onc You will of course need write privileges for the destination directory. The headers, libraries and executables will be built and installed under the ROOT. The demonstration services in the demo directory are not built by the top-level "make install" command. To build these, cd to the cmd/demo directory and enter "make". The four services will be built. RPCGEN MUST BE INSTALLED in a path that make can find. To run the services, rpcbind must be running, then invoke the service (you probably will want to put it in the background). rpcinfo can be used to check that the service succeeded in getting registered with rpcbind, and to ping the service (see rpcinfo's man page). You can then use the corresponding client program to exercise the service. BUILDING ONC APPLICATIONS See the Makefiles in the demonstration services for examples of building ONC applications with this release. The $(ROOT)/usr/include directory must be included in the compiler header file search path (-I), and the $(ROOT)/usr/lib directory must be included in the linker library file search path (-L). Also, to run executables built dynamically, the shared library search path (LD_LIBRARY_PATH) must also include $(ROOT)/usr/lib. In addition to linking in this release's librpc (via -lrpc), you must also link with Solaris's libnsl (-lnsl) and the US domestic version of libcrypt (-lcrypt).