HETEROGENEOUS DATA TRANSLATION SYSTEM

A method and apparatus facilitating the exchange of data between application programs written in a higher level language and running on separate heterogeneous computer platforms, without concern for possible differences in internal data formats in the separate platforms. Each message format to be the subject of exchange among heterogeneous computer platforms is preregistered with each such platform by writing and executing a computer program that contains a definition of the message format in the higher level language. Preregistration produces a message description file in each platform, which is used at initialization time to generate a field descriptor tree in each platform. When a message is to be transmitted, it is first translated to a universal meta format, making use of the field descriptor tree, and on receipt at another platform is translated back to the native format of the receiving platform. Thus, data messages are exchanged without concern for the internal data formats used by the separate platforms.