Product: OpenFusion JacORB

Version: 2

Description:

What is the "-sloppy_names" switch on the IDL compiler for?

Resolution:

The -sloppy_names has been provided to allow backwards compatibility with earlier versions of the CORBA specification. It allows less strict checking of the module name scoping. Ideally the IDL should be changed to comply with the latest specification. 

CORBA IDL has a number of name resolution rules that are stricter than necessary for Java (e.g., a struct member's name identifier must not equal the type name).  The -sloppy_names option relaxes the checking of these rules. Note that IDL accepted with this option will be rejected by other, conformant IDL compilers.

For example, the -sloppy_names option allows idl of the following type to compile.

module M
{
    typedef short M;
    interface I
    {
        void i (in short j);
    };
};

It does not allow the following IDL to compile:

typedef long TheThing;
typedef long theThing;