Client/Server apps using custom objects

Question

I have wrote an ip transaction server and I am trying to pass objects across to it that don't have to reside on the server. I have created an interface that implements serializable and then the class I am trying to pass implements the interface. I read that as long as the interface is on both the client and the server that the object doesn't need to be using this approach.
I, however, keep getting a classdefnotfound error for the custom object when I do a readObject().
Can this really be done?
Thanks in advance.
Relevant code snippets:
interface Workable implements java.io.Serializable
     public abstract int getToWork();
public class test1 implements Workable
     public int getToWork()
          System.out.println("Test 11 value = ");
          return 1;
Server code:
Workable ipdata;
ipdata = (Workable)in.readObject();//Blows up trying to read object here
ipdata.getToWork();

Answer 1

Take a look at the thread on this newsgroup named:
deserialization loads classes more eagerly than construction?
That seems similar to your complaint (Java's object serialization not conforming to its own specs about "classes that don't need to be present", in that thread it is a non-serializable member object that blocks things). I get the feeling you hit a bug in Java's serialization mechanism and that it is caused by a faulty heuristic in Java serialization.