METHOD AND APPARATUS FOR EXECUTING DISTRIBUTED OBJECTS OVER A NETWORK

• US 20020083208A1
• Filed: 06/29/1998
• Published: 06/27/2002
• Est. Priority Date: 06/29/1998
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Oracle America, Inc. (Oracle Corporation)
• Original Assignee: Sun Microsystems Incorporated (Oracle Corporation)
• Inventors: ABDELNUR, ALEJANDRO H.
• Granted Patent: US 6,636,900 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 719/310
• CPC Class Codes: G06F 2209/549 Remote execution
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/10 in which an application is distributed across nodes in the network software deployment G06F8/60; multiprogramming arrangements G06F9/46
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 67/34 involving the movement of software or configuration parameters network booting or remote initial program loading [RIPL] G06F9/4416
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 69/329 in the application layer [OSI layer 7]
• CPC Class Codes: H04L 9/40 Network security protocols

Abstract

A method and apparatus for developing, distributing, and executing workers (e.g., objects) of an application in a client computer and over a network of computers in a manner that is hidden to a user or programmer. The workers may be distributed to any computer (e.g., server computer) in the network and can be located by a requesting computer (e.g., client computer). The distributed workers may be executed locally or remotely to produce an output value for use in a requesting computer application. Interprocess communications between the requesting computer and other network computers are hidden to a client computer user.

Claims

1. A method for executing a distributed object of a program over a network of computers, comprising the steps of:

distributing an object of a compiled program to a remote computer connected to a local computer over a network;

running the program on the local computer;

sending a request for the object from the local computer to the remote computer;

executing the object on the remote computer to produce an output value; and

routing the output value to the local computer over the network for use in the running program.

2. The method of claim 1 further comprising the steps of:

developing the program in object-oriented code;

compiling the program; and

saving the program on the local computer.

3. The method of claim 2 wherein the developing step includes the step of programming the program using the Java programming language.

4. The method of claim 3 wherein the programming step includes the step of creating a worker in the Java programming language to use as an object of the program.

5. The method of claim 1 wherein the sending step includes the step of executing a software interface between the running program and a searching program resident in the local computer to find the requested object on the network in a manner transparent to a user.

6. The method of claim 1 wherein the distributing step includes the step of distributing an object of the program without modifying the object.

7. A method for executing an object of a program, comprising the steps of:

storing a compiled, object-oriented program in a first location and an object of the program in a second location;

running the program on the computer;

sending a request for object to the second location;

executing an instance of the object using an input value from the running program to generate an output value; and

using the output value in the running program.

8. The method of claim 7 further comprising the step of developing the compiled, object-oriented program using the Java programming language.

9. The method of claim 8 wherein the developing step includes the step of creating a worker in the Java programming language to use as an object of the program.

10. The method of claim 7 wherein the sending step includes the step of invoking a local program for searching the memory of the computer for the object.

11. A method for executing a distributed object of an program on a server computer connected to a network, comprising the steps of:

receiving a request from a source computer for an object stored in a memory of the server computer, the object originating from a compiled program on the source computer;

searching the memory of the server computer to locate the object;

retrieving a copy of the object from memory;

executing the object using input values included in the request to produce an output value; and

sending the output value to the source computer for use in a running program.

12. The method of claim 11 further comprising the step of creating a thread to process the object request.

13. The method of claim 12 further comprising the step of scheduling the thread with another thread created on the server computer.

14. The method of claim 11 wherein the executing step includes the step of temporarily storing information used during the execution of the object.

16. The data processing system of claim 15 wherein the first computer is a client computer capable of running a program written in the Java programming language.

17. The data processing system of claim 15 wherein the second computer is a server computer capable of running a program written in the Java programming language.

18. The data processing system of claim 15 wherein the program includes platform-independent, object-oriented code.

20. The computer-readable medium of claim 19 wherein the distributing step includes the step of storing an address of the remote computer in a memory of the local computer in order to subsequently find the object.

21. The computer-readable medium of claim 19 wherein the sending step includes the step of executing a software interface between the running program and a searching program resident in the local computer to find the object on the network.

15. A data processing system, comprising:

a first computer for developing a program with a plurality of objects, the first computer having;

a memory configured to store the program;

a compiler configured to compile the program;

a communications device configured to distribute an object of the program to a remote location; and

a processor configured to run the program; and

a second computer in communication with the first computer over a network, the second computer having;

a memory configured to store an object of the program distributed to the second computer over the network;

a processor configured to execute an instance of the object when requested by the first computer to generate an output value; and

a communications device configured to send the output value to the first computer over the network for use in the running program.

19. A computer-readable medium containing instructions for controlling a data processing system to perform a method, comprising the steps of:

distributing an object of a compiled object-oriented code program from a local computer to a remote computer connected over a network;

running the program on the local computer;

determining a need to invoke the object in the running program;

sending a request for the object from the local computer to the remote computer;

executing an instance of the object on the remote computer to produce an output value; and

sending the output value to the local computer over the network for use in the running program.

22. A data processing system, comprising:

means for distributing an object of an object-oriented code program from a first computer to a second computer connected over a network;

means for running the program on the first computer;

means for determining a need to invoke the object in the running program;

means for sending a request for the object from the first computer to the second computer;

means for executing an instance of the object on the second computer to produce an output value; and

means for sending the output value to the first computer over the network for use in the running program.