The Perl Toolchain Summit needs more sponsors. If your company depends on Perl, please support this very important event.
 / 
RMI-0.10
River stage zero No dependents
++
/ RMI::ProxyObject

NAME

RMI::ProxyObject - used internally by RMI for "stub" objects

VERSION

This document describes RMI::ProxyObject v0.10.

DESCRIPTION

This class is the real class of all transparent proxy objects, though objects of this class will attempt to hide that fact.

This is an internal class used by RMI::Client and RMI::Server nodes. Objects of this class are never constructed explicitly by applications. They are made as a side effect of data passing between client and server. Any time an RMI::Client or RMI::Server "passes" an object as a parameter or a return value, an RMI::ProxyObject is created on the other side.

Note that RMI::ProxyObjects are also "tied" to the package RMI::ProxyReference, which handles attempts to use the reference as a plain Perl reference.

The full explanation of how references, blessed and otherwise, are proxied across an RMI::Client/RMI::Server pair (or any RMI::Node pair) is in RMI::ProxyReference.

METHODS

The goal of objects of this class is to simulate a specific object on the other side of a specific RMI::Node (RMI::Client or RMI::Server). As such, this does not have its own API.

This class does, however, overridefour special Perl methods in ways which are key to its ability to proxy method calls:

AUTOLOAD

AUTOLOAD directs all method calls across the connection which created it to the remote side for actual execution.

isa

Since calls to isa() will not fire AUTOLOAD, isa() is explicitly overridden to redirect through the RMI::Node which owns the object in question.

can

Since calls to can() will also not fire AUTOLOAD, we override can() explicitly as well to redirect through the RMI::Node which owns the object in question.

DESTROY

The DESTROY handler manages ensuring that the remote side reduces its reference count and can do correct garbage collection. The destroy handler on the other side will fire as well at that time to do regular cleanup.

BUGS AND CAVEATS

the proxy object is only MOSTLY transparent

Ways to detect that an object is an RMI::ProxyObject are:

 1. ref($obj) will return "RMI::ProxyObject" unless the entire class
has been proxied (with $client->use_remote('SomeClass').

 2. "$obj" will stringify to "RMI::ProxyObject=SOMETYPE(...)", though
this will probaby be changed at a future date.

See general bugs in RMI for general system limitations of proxied objects.

SEE ALSO

RMI, RMI::Client, RMI::Server,RMI::ProxyReference, RMI::Node

AUTHORS

Scott Smith <sakoht@cpan.org>

COPYRIGHT

Copyright (c) 2008 - 2009 Scott Smith <sakoht@cpan.org> All rights reserved.

LICENSE

This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify it under the same terms as Perl itself.

The full text of the license can be found in the LICENSE file included with this module.