Each Broker in a territory is directly connected to each of its peers. For example, in a territory that consists of Brokers A, B, C and D, Broker A has a connection to Brokers B, C, and D; Broker B has connections to A, C, and D; Broker C has a connection to Brokers A, B, and D, and so forth.

Each Broker in a territory maintains a Remote Broker object for each of the Brokers to which it is connected. This object acts as the server-side state object for the Broker at the other end of the connection.

In this capacity, the Remote Broker object serves the same function as does a client state object for a regular Broker client program. Like a client state object, the Remote Broker object maintains a list of subscriptions and a queue for the remote Broker.

However, unlike an ordinary client state object, a Remote Broker object also functions as a client of the remote Broker. In this capacity, the Remote Broker object continually retrieves documents for the local Broker from its queue on the remote Broker.