I'm still here, although I don't have sufficient resources to dedicate to
the job, I'd be quite happy to talk with whomever is going to do this
about the issues.
I do still have the IDL files I generated (there are more issues than the
oh-so-popular "which ORB?" one), and there is quite a bit of work that has
to be done to make them work, even as an interface to the standard
protocol.
On the subject of ORB, and having looked at a large number of them, I
think an abstraction layer is a good thing for us to have. A loadable
interface module will solve the RPM problem... (and perhaps the whole
backward-compatability problem, if the existing protocol just becomes
another "plugin")
Taral
P.S. Please Cc: me on replies, I'm not on the list.