An Architecture for A Scalable Wide Area Distributed System

Current wide area distributed systems fail to hide implementation aspects related to the distribution of information. Unfortunately, the solutions developed for local systems do not scale, so a different approach is needed. In this paper we present an architecture for distributed systems that scales to support a large number of users and objects. The architecture is based on the concept of distributed shared objects, which are used for sharing and exchanging information over wide area networks. Our architecture provides location and replication transparency, and offers the flexibility needed to cope with the heterogeneity inherent in wide area systems.