Invoking Java code across Application Server cluster nodes

Question

Let's say I have a Java webapp deployed on some Application Server with clustering across a few nodes.

In the webapp, we maintain a cache of some values retrieved from the database, stored in-memory as static variables. Whenever a user performs an update in a particular screen, we clear the cache so that the cached values will be retrieved again the next time they are needed.

Now the problem: Since each node in the cluster is running on a separate JVM, how can I clear the cache across all nodes? Basically I want to call a static function on each cluster node. Is there some standard J2EE way to do this, or it depends on the Application Server software?

Answer 1

On a 'standard' application server like Jboss you could use JMX or Message Beans for that.