From: James Edward Gray II <james@...>
Date: 2005-10-22T08:40:37+09:00
Subject: Re: DRb Basics

On Oct 19, 2005, at 4:59 PM, James Edward Gray II wrote:

> 1.  This is mostly a curiosity, but how does this work, really?
>
> I guess I half expected that each() call not to work because of the  
> block, which can't be marshaled, obviously.  Was the Hash marshaled  
> down to the client and each() called there?  How often does this  
> transference happen, every method call?  I'm trying to decide how  
> up to date my data will be, at any given time, mainly.

I have learned a little now and can sort of answer this, I think.   
Under normal operation, DRb marshals an Array of method name and  
arguments over the wire to the target object, then marshals back some  
results.

Some things change this though, like the use of blocks or DRbUndumped...

> 2.  How does the use of DRbUndumped change the answer(s) to #1.

This causes DRb to send a proxy object who's every call will be  
forwarded back to the local copy over the wire.  This is what makes  
blocks possible.

> 5.  I've poked around in the documents on ruby-doc.org, read the  
> Chad Fowler article, and read the short sections in the Pickaxe2.   
> Any good DRb documentation I'm missing?

This link is one of the more helpful explanations:

http://www.rubygarden.org/ruby?DrbTutorial

James Edward Gray II