Interprocess communication with D-Bus and HAL
FAST TRAFFIC
It’s the end of the line for CORBA! Gnome now relies on the D-Bus messaging system, and KDE is in the process of migrating.
Nobody likes applications that spend all day sitting in the corners of the desktop and refusing to talk to anything else. The least you might expect would be for them to exchange data with other desktop residents using simple drag & drop techniques. But many users expect their programs to demonstrate more advanced communication skills at all levels. Of course, users want pluggable USB disks no matter what program they are using. And VOIP softphones should make friends with the new hardware when you change the headset without demanding a reboot. To allow this to happen, a Linux system needs a communication system that lets desktop applications talk to one another and to the underlying levels right down through the kernel to the hardware. And if the Freedesktop developers have any say in the matter, D-Bus [1], which relies on Hardware Abstraction Layer HAL [2], will be the communication system for future generations of Linux.
Buy this article as PDF
(incl. VAT)
Buy Linux Magazine
US / Canada
UK / Australia
Subscribe to our Linux Newsletters
Find Linux and Open Source Jobs
Subscribe to our ADMIN Newsletters
Support Our Work
Linux Magazine content is made possible with support from readers like you. Please consider contributing when you’ve found an article to be beneficial.
News
-
Wayland 1.24 Released with Fixes and New Features
Wayland continues to move forward, while X11 slowly vanishes into the shadows, and the latest release includes plenty of improvements.
-
Bugs Found in sudo
Two critical flaws allow users to gain access to root privileges.
-
Fedora Continues 32-Bit Support
In a move that should come as a relief to some portions of the Linux community, Fedora will continue supporting 32-bit architecture.
-
Linux Kernel 6.17 Drops bcachefs
After a clash over some late fixes and disagreements between bcachefs's lead developer and Linus Torvalds, bachefs is out.
-
ONLYOFFICE v9 Embraces AI
Like nearly all office suites on the market (except LibreOffice), ONLYOFFICE has decided to go the AI route.
-
Two Local Privilege Escalation Flaws Discovered in Linux
Qualys researchers have discovered two local privilege escalation vulnerabilities that allow hackers to gain root privileges on major Linux distributions.
-
New TUXEDO InfinityBook Pro Powered by AMD Ryzen AI 300
The TUXEDO InfinityBook Pro 14 Gen10 offers serious power that is ready for your business, development, or entertainment needs.
-
LibreOffice Tested as Possible Office 365 Alternative
Another major organization has decided to test the possibility of migrating from Microsoft's Office 365 to LibreOffice.
-
Linux Mint 20 Reaches EOL
With Linux Mint 20 at its end of life, the time has arrived to upgrade to Linux Mint 22.
-
TuxCare Announces Support for AlmaLinux 9.2
Thanks to TuxCare, AlmaLinux 9.2 (and soon version 9.6) now enjoys years of ongoing patching and compliance.