-------- Original Message -------- Subject: CFP: Communication Abstractions for Distributed Systems Date: Wed, 12 Feb 2003 13:30:02 +0100 From: Ludger Fiege fiege@RBG.INFORMATIK.TU-DARMSTADT.DE Reply-To: Mailing List der GI FG 3.3.1 "Kommunikation und Verteilte Systeme" KUVS-L@LISTSERV.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE To: KUVS-L@LISTSERV.UNI-HEIDELBERG.DE

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Call for Papers

Communication Abstractions for Distributed Systems

Workshop at ECOOP'2003, July 22, 2003, Darmstadt, Germany

more details on http://perso-info.enst-bretagne.fr/~beugnard/ecoop/WS-CADS-CFP.html

* Important dates

April 25, 2003 : Position paper deadline May 17, 2003 : Notification of acceptance Tuesday July 22, 2003 : The workshop

* Abstract

As applications become increasingly distributed and networks provide more and more connection facilities, applications require more and more interconnections, thus communication takes a central part of modern systems. To tackle the communication issues, a lot of techniques and concepts have been developed in different research fields and some industrial solutions have been proposed. Over the last 15 years, the basic building blocks for distributed object systems have emerged: distributed objects, communicating with Remote Message Send (RMS), also known as Remote Method Invocation (RMI) or Location-Independent Invocation (LII). However, it has also become clear that while such abstractions are by themselves sufficient to expose the hard problems of distributed computing, they do not solve them.

Hence, since large applications parts have been underlined like databases systems or graphical user interface, the goal is to wonder, if can we say the same for the communication part of applications?

At the previous ECOOP workshops on The Next 701 Distributed Object Systems, we identified some of these problems (Security, Partial Failure, Guaranteeing Quality of Service, Run-time evolution, Meta-Object protocols, and Ordering of events) that are important concerns of any communication abstraction. Some Communication Abstractions were identified at ECOOP'2002 in Malaga such as Peer-to-peer abstract data structure, or publish/subscribe variants. The goal of this workshop is to work on the definition of new and good communication abstractions and on the distributed-specific features mentioned above.

* Format

The goal is to define and refine abstractions that address some of these problems and other like them. What are the right abstractions, APIs, development methods, reasoning systems, and tools for building the next generation of Distributed Object Systems?

This workshop aims to foster discussion during the workshop and to avoid a mini-conference. Sessions of discussions and presentations will be grouped according to a list of selected issues raised by the position papers.

* Submission

We are interested in papers reporting practical experiences relating both benefits and obstacles in using communication abstractions in various application fields. The word "abstraction" should be understood as "higher level" not as "hidden and fuzzy things". Communication abstractions must be precise even if their implementation is hidden. The main questions are what are these abstractions, how are they specified and finally how to implement them. At previous year's ECOOP workshops on The Next 701 Distributed Object Systems, we studied some problems inherent to distribution - Security, Partial Failure, Guaranteeing Quality of Service, Run-Time Evolution - and considered what tools an object system might supply to help address them - grouping objects into components, immutable objects, application-level protocols, reflection (both introspection and reification), and event-ordering.

This year participants are invited either to consider some of these issues and propose tools more deeply, or to make this list more complete by demonstrating common needs in other distributed applications.

Possible sub-topics include:

* Communication abstractions from various origins including: Architecture Description Languages (ADL), and especially connectors UML collaboration as communication abstractions UML collaboration refinement and implementation Coordination techniques Middleware services Mediators Glueware techniques Communication abstraction in programming languages Design Patterns for communication and distribution Composition of protocols, customizable communication frameworks, (was micro-protocols) Communication components

* Security: Authentication, authorization, privacy Protection from malicious hackers What can run where?

* Application Services: Mobility Migration Persistence

* Other Communication Protocols (beyond RMS): Publish & Subscribe Data-centric computing, e.g., real-rate ows Group-oriented communication

* Tolerance of Partial Failures: Transactions Alternatives to transactions

* Run-time Evolution: of classes and interfaces of persistent data

* Meta-Object protocols, e.g., changing the meaning of message send

* Ordering of events

* Peer to peer computing

Position papers, not to exceed 6 pages in length, are solicited by April 25, 2003. Papers based on experience with the above issues are particularly welcome. Please send positions papers electronically in PDF or Postscript format to: Antoine.Beugnard@enst-bretagne.fr Notification of acceptance will be given by 17th of May.

A maximum of 20 participants will be selected on the basis of the submitted material. The number of participants per position paper is limited to 2.

* Contact info and affiliation of the organizers

Antoine Beugnard(Chair): antoine.beugnard@enst-bretagne.fr, ENST-Bretagne, Brest, France Eric Jul (Co-chair) : eric@diku.dk, DIKU, University of Copenhagen, Copenhagen, Denmark Monique Calisti, Whitestein Technologies AG, Switzerland Laurence Duchien, Université de Lille, France Ludger Fiege, Darmstadt University of Technology, Germany Robert Filman, NASA Ames Research Center, USA Jean-Marc Jézéquel, INRIA, France Anne-Marie Kermarrec, Microsoft Research, UK Salah Sadou, Valoria, Université de Bretagne Sud, France

* Info about the Workshop Reader

Springer-Verlag will publish the ECOOP 2003 Ws Reader as an LNCS volume. This book will include a report for each workshop. The organizers will write the report, in collaboration with the participants of the workshop. The organizers should produce a report that provides a summary of the workshop with the major issues discussed and the conclusions of the working groups (if applicable). The report should also include the current research being carried out in the area and open research directions on the workshop themes.

Note that best positions papers will be proposed for publication in the IEEE Distributed Systems Online.