[GENERAL] programatic database dump

[Tomi NA]

I'd like to dump a postgresql database from my (java) app and copy the dump file to the client machine.
This backup strategy prooved invalueable in the past (given enough room on the harddrives, which I have) and I'd like to implement it now with postgresql.
Is there something like a system stored procedure that does something like that I can use? Calling pg_dump seems like a bad hack: I'd like to keep communication at the java<->sql level if possible. I'll probably bare it, but I'd like to check if I've missed something, first.

TIA,
Tomislav