Architecture · 1991–2008 · Object Wave
CORBA
Language-agnostic distributed objects. Complexity scaled faster than value for most shops.
CORBA promised universal reuse and delivered universal integration hell. IDL compilers, vendor ORBs, and governance boards ate budgets while HTTP got a curl client. It failed because objects do not magically compose across organizational boundaries.
Cost of the fad
Enterprises spent years on IDL, ORBs, and vendor lock-in for distributed objects that SOAP and REST later made look quaint — after the invoices cleared.
Patterns
Context
Everything became an object — until it didn't
Objects promised reuse; enterprises bought the promise in bulk. Java gave a portable runtime with real teeth. CORBA and UML-heavy processes gave vendors a decade of workshops. The survivors were the languages and platforms that outlived the methodology theater. The lesson — complexity sold as architecture burns cash — returns every decade with new branding.
Compare with
Related
Architecture · 2003–2015
Enterprise SOA
Reuse via shared services — in theory. In practice: central buses and political ownership fights.
$ ESBs, governance boards, and "service portfolios" burned seven-figure programs. Many orgs got distributed monoliths with worse latency and a permanent integration team.
Language · 1995–now
Java
Write once, run everywhere — then enterprise forever. Still the backbone of serious backend estates.
Architecture · 2000–2016
SOAP / WS-*
Enterprise web services with ceremony. Interoperability theater with XML envelopes.
$ Banks and governments sunk fortunes into WS-Security, WSDL toolchains, and vendor stacks — then quietly rebuilt on REST/JSON while still paying maintenance on the old bus.