Chapter 1. Introduction to JXTA

You're driving home at night; it's late and you're hungry. Imagine that your car has a device that automatically locates nearby restaurants and tells you which of them has the food you want at the best price. Better yet — what if you could contact nearby drivers, see if any of them also want to stop for food, and spontaneously form a group that negotiates with a nearby restaurant for a volume discount?

While you're waiting in the restaurant, you run into an old business acquaintance; in a brief discussion, you realize that she is working on a project that could provide a key feature for your own work. You could exchange business cards with her, of course, but why not immediately exchange the specifications of your projects instead?