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javaipcrmirpc
Sven Jacobs
Sven Jacobs

Reputation: 6995

Which Java RMI/RPC/IPC technology should I use?

I'm developing a Java application that consists of a server and a client (possibly multiple clients in future) which may run on different hosts.

For communication between these two I currently use a custom protocol which consists of JSON messages that are sent over network sockets and that are converted back to Java Bean objects on both sides. However the more complex the application gets I notice that this method doesn't meet my standards and is too complex.

I'm looking for a well established, possibly standardized alternative.

I've looked at Remote Method Invocation (RMI) but read that the protocol is slow (big network overhead).

The technology I'm looking for should be lightweight (protocol and library wise), robust, maybe support compression (big plus if it does!), maybe support encryption, well document and well established (e.g. an Apache project). It should be as easy as calling a method on a remote object with RMI but without its disadvantages.

What can you recommend?

Upvotes: 6

Views: 7110

Answers (6)

boneill
boneill

Reputation: 1516

This really all depends on what kind of compatibility you require between client and server. CORBA is a well established and standardized way of communicating between different languages, but it requires a bit more effort to use than Java RMI. If the clients are running from some external, untrusted source, then an HTTP based protocol makes more sense. If you follow a REST approach, then it becomes easier to scale out later as you need to add more servers.

If both client and server are Java, and they are running within a trusted network, RMI meets your requirements for being "well established". Performance overhead of RMI is exaggerated, but very early versions did not pool connections.

If you're willing to toss away both "well established" and "standardized", you can use Dirmi as a substitute for RMI. It's faster, easier, has more features, and it doesn't have the firewall problems RMI has. Like RMI, it supports TLS (encryption), but neither supports built-in compression.

Whatever you choose, beware of lock-in. Try to design your server such that the remote access layer is a thin layer over the core code. This allows you to easily support multiple protocols, perhaps at the same time.

Upvotes: 3

John Raykowski
John Raykowski

Reputation: 11

Seriously, unless you're doing a web app that already requires the web baggage, you really do want RMI or, even better, CORBA. I recommend JacORB (www.jacorb.org).

Ignore general claims of slow/fast and perform your own performance tests.

Keep in mind that a software project is successful because it performs the useful function for which it was designed and intended, not because it uses the latest cool buzzword tech.

Good luck.

Upvotes: 1

ide
ide

Reputation: 20788

Avro is an Apache project that is designed for cross-language RPC (see Thrift for its spiritual predecessor). It is fairly new (less than two years old), so it isn't as well-established as RMI, for example. You should still give it a chance, though; large projects like Cassandra are moving to Avro. Avro is also a sub-project under Hadoop and has been receiving healthy support from that community.

It designed to be fast and support multiple languages, so you will probably need to introduce another step during compilation in which you translate an Avro IDL file into Java, although it isn't strictly necessary. The rest is typical RPC.

One nice thing about Avro is that its transport layers are independent of how data is represented. For example, it comes with various "transceivers" (their base communication class) for raw sockets, HTTP, and even local intra-process calls. HTTPS and SASL transceivers can provide security.

For representing data, there are encoders and decoders of various types, although the default BinaryEncoder generally suffices since Hadoop, Cassandra, etc... focus on efficiency. There is also a JsonEncoder in case you find that useful.

Upvotes: 5

Ratna Dinakar
Ratna Dinakar

Reputation: 1573

Apache MINA library for client-server communication and EJB3 will suit best

Upvotes: 0

Darwin Ling
Darwin Ling

Reputation: 11

Would you consider HTTP/REST?

If so, you can leverage something like a Tomcat/Spring, and still support all the requirements you listed ( robust, lightweight, well documented, well established )

The RPC based protocols are simply antiquated.

Upvotes: 1

Enrique
Enrique

Reputation: 10117

Mybe CORBA?

Upvotes: 1

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