Design Patterns for Concurrent and Distributed Objects

Due to the importance of distribution, object technologies, and the Web, infrastructures for Distributed Object Computing and Component-based middleware have become common place. However, it is not sufficient to just read the specification of standards such as Java RMI, EJB, or CORBA, and then to build applications using these standards. On one hand the transparency provided by these platforms helps to master the complexity of building distributed systems, but on the other hand it is inevitable to know the infrastructure's internal architectural design to leverage it efficiently. Unfortunately, the architectural principles behind infrastructures are not documented anywhere. Here, patterns come to our rescue. They do not only enable the solution of recurring problems in software development, but also help us to look inside existing software in order to understand and leverage it efficiently. Thus, the goal of the tutorial is to show the basic principles behind Distributed Object Computing and component-based Middleware. Patterns will be introduced step-by-step to reveal the overall architecture of these infrastructures. These patterns will not only help to understand middleware, but will also be applicable for the development of distributed and concurrent software systems.