HP WBEM Services Software Developer's Kit for HP-UX Provider and Client Developer's Guide A.01

Provider Implementation
Provider Design Considerations
Chapter 4 55
for HP-UX, the provider functions are called in the process context of the
CIM Server. However, the provider must not assume that it is
running in the same process as the CIM Server.
The process context in which a provider runs is determined by the CIM
Server, and is not configurable. This means that it is not possible to set
environment variables, working directory, permission mask, or any other
environment parameters before a provider is activated. Furthermore, the
provider must not set any of these during operation. If it is necessary to
do so for correct operation, the provider should create a separate process
with the needed environment, and communicate with this process by any
suitable means of interprocess communication (for example, pipes,
shared memory, files, or another mechanism).
Providers run under the root user ID in HP WBEM Services for HP-UX.
However, developers must not assume that this will continue to be
true in future releases. Please refer to the section on Security
Architecture for more information.
Providers built for IPF deployment should be compiled as native
programs. They will not work if compiled in emulation mode.
Provider Registration and Naming
Provider source code is compiled and linked to build a shared library. The
CIM Server will call the functions in this shared library when a client
requests an operation on a CIM object that the provider instruments.
The CIM Server finds the shared library containing the provider for a
particular CIM object by searching the Provider Registrations that it was
supplied when providerswere installed. Provider Registration consists of
CIM instances of three classes of objects, all defined in the
root/PG_InterOp namespace:
• PG_ProviderModule
• PG_Provider
• PG_ProviderCapabilities
PG_ProviderModule
The PG_ProviderModule object corresponds to a single shared library.
Example 4-1 shows its definition, in a MOF declaration: