JAVA Swing client, Data Access to Remote Database; Ibatis

Question

I've got a Java client that needs to access a remote database. It is the goal to hide database credentials from the user and not hardcode any credentials within the code. Therefore, the database access will probably have to be on the server side.

I'm restricted to use Ibatis as a data abstraction framework. Apart from that I have JBoss running on the webserver, allowing me to use data sources.

How would you design the remote database access and data serialization/deserialization. would you prefer web services of some kind of data stream over a socket? How would you realize either of both?

Answer 1

Build a Service Layer and expose it over RMI - possibly as EJB3 stateless session beans as you have JBoss, possibly as pure RMI. I wouldn't bother with web services unless you have a specific need. RMI will take case of serialisation for you.

Your service layer needs to expose a method to authenticate users using their credentials entered on startup of the Swing app. All calls for data go through the service layer. No SQL exists in the Swing app.

There are other benfits of this arrangment other than just hiding the database credentials. Not only do you end up with a layered architecture, but you gain efficiencies from sharing prepared statements amongst all your clients by having a single data source on the server.