The Service Locator pattern centralizes distributed service object lookups, provides a centralized point of control, and may act as a cache that eliminates redundant lookups. It also encapsulates any vendor-specific features of the lookup process. 

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192.30.92.254 where has this pattern been applied? Are your referring to stuff like UDDI (see http://www.uddi.org/)?  --DavidLiu

''It's one of the more or less standard J2EE patterns, so it's at least applicable in that context. -- Not 192.30.92.254''

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CategoryDiscovery