Solaris™ Internals: Core Kernel Components

10.6 . Solaris Doors

Doors provide a facility for processes to issue procedure calls to functions in other processes running on the same system. Using the APIs, a process can become a door server, exporting a function through a door it creates by using the door_create(3X) interface. Other processes can then invoke the procedure by issuing a door_call(3X), specifying the correct door descriptor. Our goal here is not to provide a programmer's guide to doors but rather to focus on the kernel implementation, data structures, and algorithms. Some discussion of the APIs is, of course, necessary to keep things in context, but we suggest that you refer to the manual pages and to Steven's book [25] to understand how to develop applications with doors. ...