Methods and apparatus for implementing state machines as enterprise beans
with reliable or transactional timers on an enterprise platform are
disclosed. According to one aspect of the present invention, a state
machine is arranged to be used within a computing system that supports an
enterprise platform. The state machine includes an entity object, a home
interface associated with the entity object, and a remote interface
associated with the entity object. The home interface is arranged to
create, find, and remove entity objects, while the remote interface is
arranged to drive the state machine. The entity object is arranged to be
deployed in a bean container, which includes a timer. In addition to
including a timer, the bean container is arranged to invoke the entity
object using the remote. In one embodiment, the timer is transactional.
