What Is ONC/RPC?

Date First Published: 15th June 2022

Topic: Computer Networking

Subtopic: Internet Protocols

Article Type: Computer Terms & Definitions

Difficulty Level: 10/10

Learn more about what ONC/RPC is in this article.

Stands for Open Network Computing Remote Procedure Call. ONC/RPC, also known as Sun RPC is a remote procedure call system that was originally developed by Sun Microsystems in the 1980s. It was defined in RFC 1831, which was published in 1995. The current version is RFC 5531, which was published in 2009. In RFC 2695, RFC 2203, and RFC 2623, authentication methods are defined.

Note:

Remote procedure call is a software communication protocol that can be used by a program in order to request a service from a program that is located in another computer on a network without having to understand the details of the network. In other words, it enables the ability to run code or a program from a remote source.

ONC is based on calling conventions that are used in Unix and the C programming language. Data is translated using the External Data Representation (XDR), which encodes and decodes data that can be accessed on more than one platform. The data (payload) is then delivered using UDP or TCP. A port mapper provides access to RPC services on a computer, which asks for queries on a well-known port.