Generic Provider?

[Je...@manulife.com]

The idea of pluggable providers triggered a thought but it seems a bit far
fetched. I'd like to validate that with you:

It seems that there is a potential for a smart generic provider that can
invoke anything, anywhere, using anymethod.

What is passed to this generic provider is of course the parts of the call:
1. object name, 2. method name, 3. parameters,

The smart provider needs to perform the following:

1. lookup the object name in a directory, config file, deployment
descriptor, ...

2. the result of this lookup is either null or another object describing
the invocation details invocationInfo

3. if the result is null, then the object is local and the deployment
descriptor suffices -- business as usual

4. If an invocation info is returned then the following can be extracted
from that object:
     - the URI of the actual object (servername, object name, protocol,
...)
     - the creation method (ie. RMI, EJB, ...)
     - based on the creation method, some more creation info or creation
object (factory name, factory method, ...)

5. the provider then creates the object according to the instructions
(create home, call home.create(), initialize, ...)

6. using the reference to the objet, call the method in the initial call,
pass the parameters, get the result

7. return the result to SOAP.

Thanks

Jeff Saremi
Manulife Financial
416.926.3000 x7005
Fax: 416.926.5366
Jeff_Saremi@manulife.com