Gateways for accessing fault tolerance domains

Abstract

Enterprise applications can be structured as domains, where each domain contains objects that are replicated for fault tolerance, with the replication being managed by a fault tolerance infrastructure local to the domain. Gateways can allow unreplicated clients to benefit from the fault tolerance services of the replicated servers, without compromising replica consistency within the fault tolerance domain. For CORBA-based enterprise applications, the gateway mechanisms can be implemented transparently to the ORB and to the application using interception; specific enhancements to existing ORBs make it possible for unreplicated clients to enjoy a higher degree of reliability.