Java Network Programming, 3rd Edition

Chapter 18. Remote Method Invocation

Historically, networking has been concerned with two fundamental applications. The first application is moving files and data between hosts and is handled by FTP, SMTP, HTTP, NFS, IMAP, POP, and many other protocols. The second application is allowing one host to run programs on another host. This is the traditional province of Telnet, rlogin, Remote Procedure Call (RPC), and a lot of database middleware. Most of this book has implicitly concerned itself with file and data transfer. Remote Method Invocation (RMI), however, is an example of the second application for networking: running a program on a remote host from a local machine.

RMI is a core Java API and class library that allows Java programs running in one Java virtual machine to call methods in objects running in a different virtual machine, even when the two virtual machines are running on physically separate hosts. In essence, parts of a single Java program run on a local computer while other parts of the same program run on a remote host. RMI creates the illusion that this distributed program is running on one system with one memory space holding all the code and data used on either side of the actual physical connection.

What Is Remote Method Invocation?

RMI lets Java objects on different hosts communicate with each other in a way that’s similar to how objects running in the same virtual machine communicate with each other: by calling methods in objects. A remote object lives on a server. ...