October 1993
Almost all computer systems are connected to a network supporting data communications. As a result, many techniques have evolved to support the development of applications which require processes on different systems to communicate and coordinate their activities. One such technique is remote procedure call (RPC). RPC is a mature method with several specifications and implementations. Among these are: Open Network Computing (ONC) RPC, Distributed Computing Environment (DCE) RPC, and the RPC specification from the International Organization for Standardization (ISO).
This report describes the RPC concept, how this concept is commonly implemented, and compares the features and capabilities of these three RPCs. The RPC language, semantics, and protocol of ONC RPC, DCE RPC, and ISO RPC are compared. Since ONC RPC and DCE RPC have implementations, the output of their RPC language compiler and the support provided by their runtime libraries are also compared.