1. Apparatus for efficient representation of variable length object identifiers in a distributed object system having a client and an object server, the apparatus comprising: a database containing a plurality of compact object identifiers; an ID server having a method responsive to a variable length object identifier for retrieving compact object identifiers from the database and returning one of the retrieved compact object identifiers which corresponds to the variable length identifier; and an IDL interface available to the object server for invoking the ID server method over the distributed object system.