DCE Technology at Work

DCE Technology at Work

How can I grant access to corporate information, in a diverse computing environment, without compromising security?

DCE has an answer

"DCE is the logical choice for us, looking at the problem we had to solve -- communicating between diverse hardware and systems distributed all over the world. We needed security that was accepted in the industry, could be audited, provided encryption and authentication, and was available on the various platforms we use. DCE allowed us to address our security needs without limiting our choice of platforms. Now that DCE is available on Windows NT, we use it as a mainstream development platform -- and we didn't have to change our software to make the move. We want to have a fully DCE secure Web server and browser combination, to create a virtual private network that you can run over public networks."

Tom Provost, Manager
Communications Systems & Services
Schlumberger

How can I deploy distributed object technology from different vendors on my network and be sure they'll all work together?

DCE has an answer

DCE is a galvanizing force behind the movement toward distributed object technology because the use of DCE technology leads to interoperability of different object strategies. DCE provides a foundation for distributed, object-oriented computing without precluding use of other approaches such as CORBA. Some of the vendors incorporating DCE technology as part of their object technology offerings include: Digital Equipment Corporation, IBM, Hewlett-Packard, and Microsoft. Most major vendors have expressed their intent to use DCE RPC as an environment-specific protocol within the CORBA specification to provide interoperability.

How can I web-enable my enterprise, for interacting with customers and employees, and still enforce our security policies?

DCE has an answer

Security for an Intranet/Internet environment is crucial to its business success. The Open Group Research Institute's Secure Enterprise Web is an advanced technology that takes advantage of DCE security and naming. The project includes a multiple-protocol Web/DCE server as well as a secure local proxy that can be used with unmodified off-the-shelf web browsers to provide secure local access and a secure gateway to the Web.

"The rise of the Internet and associated technologies such as TCP/IP, browsers, and the WWW opens up a new window of opportunity for DCE. From a technical standpoint, DCE could meet the growing need for enhancements to security, access control, and resource administration facilities in current Internet solutions."

IDC Computer Networking Architectures bulletin
Outlook for DCE: The View from the Crest
October 1996

DCE GDA-LDAP & DCE RPC NSI - LDAP Integration Efforts

The Open Group has had two related projects to integrate DCE naming services with LDAP. These projects produced portable reference implementations of the GDA and NSI components of DCE

The first was the integration of LDAP into the Global Directory Agent, allowing DCE to use LDAP to easily find cells across the Internet.

The second was the integration of the LDAP client into the RPC NSI, allowing clients and servers to use and register themselves with LDAP.

DCE-Web

The Open Group's DCE-Web project showed how DCE can be used to address some of the Web's problems with naming and security.

The source is publicly available for academic, research and evaluation purposes.