The naming service can be used to manage a directory of objects and to map the name of each object to its associated object reference. To locate a server object somewhere in a CORBA environment, a client can locate the naming service and then use a name to retrieve an associated object reference from the naming service.
The location of the naming server that provides the naming service and the number of the port that it uses to communicate with clients and servers are specified by the WebSphere run-time properties. The values that you specify for the run-time properties must match the equivalent settings used to configure the WebSphere Application Server.
Object references are bound into the naming service relative to the root naming context.
When a client is started, it uses a "bootstrapping" operation to locate the naming service and obtain the root naming context, as follows:
The following is an example of this "bootstrapping" procedure:
objPtr = op->resolve_initial_references( "NameService" ); rootNameContext = ::CosNaming::NamingContext::_narrow(objPtr);
Bootstrapping of the Naming Server is one example of using "Initial References".
If the client bootstrapping operation does not establish contact with a remote naming service, you can use alternative strategies to retrieve the Interoperable Object Reference (IOR) of the naming service, as outlined in the topic "Strategies for retrieving the IOR of a remote object".