Adaptable Component Frameworks for Middleware

As a cornerstone of next generation software, adaptation is a property which must be present throughout the entire life cycle, from design to execution. We develop then a vision where adaptation is not only a property that is desirable for end-user applications, but also for the middleware platform that executes these applications. Until now, middleware is a rather specialized activity where each new environment forces the development of a corresponding platform, which is specific to the given environment. This has led to a large number of platforms (from Web Services, to EJB, to CORBA, to ad hoc middleware for embedded systems). Although at a high level, solutions for communication interoperability often exist between these platforms, they stay loosely coupled and separated. Furthermore, the concepts which are at the core of these platforms and their architectures are too different to allow, for example, sharing technical services.

The research challenge that we propose here is to define and develop middleware and associated services which could be adapted to a broad range of environments from grid computing, to Internet-based applications, to local networks, to mobile applications on PDA's and smart phones, to embedded systems. The benefits of that are twofold. First, it enables the easier deployment of mobile applications in different environments by taking advantage of the common ground provided by adaptable middleware. Second, middleware is a rapidly changing domain where new technologies appear frequently. Yet, up to now, each new technological shift has imposed a complete re-development of the middleware. Having a common ground on which middleware is built would help in such transitions by fostering reuse. In terms of industrial output, the impact of these results will also be helpful for software editors and companies to adapt their products more rapidly to new and emerging middleware technologies.

This research challenge has close links with MDE and product line families. We believe that the added value of our proposal is to cover a more integrated solution: we are not only interested in middleware design with MDE technologies, but we also wish to integrate them with software component technologies and advanced programming techniques, such as AOP. We will then cover a broad spectrum of middleware construction, from design (MDE) to implementation (CBSE) to application development (AOP).

Distributed Application Design for Adaptive Platforms

Considering adaptation in the first design steps of an application allows for its preparation and follow-up during the entire life-cycle. As mentioned previously, some software paradigms help already in the design and the development of adaptable applications. AOSD proposes separation of concerns and weaving of models in order to increase the mastering and the evolution of software. MDE consists of evolving complex software systems by raising the level of abstraction from source code to models. Several programming approaches, such as AOP or reflective approaches, have gained in popularity to implement flexibility. Other approaches, such as CBSE, propose compositional way for reuse and compose sub-systems in the application building. Finally, context-aware programming for mobile environment proposes solutions in order to consider context evolution. Overall, the objective of these approaches is to assist the development of applications that are generic and that can be adapted with respect to the properties of the domain or the context.

The research challenge that we propose to address here is similar to static points of variation in product line families. We plan to study dynamic points of variation in order to take into account adaptation in the first design steps and to match this variation. The first research challenge is the introduction of elements in the modeling phase that allow the specification of evolution related properties. These properties must make it possible to build safe and dynamic software architectures. We wish to express and validate properties in the entire software life cycle. These properties are functional, non-functional, static, behavioral, or even qualitative properties. We also want to be able to check that all the properties are present, that the obtained behavior is the expected one, and that the quality of service is not degraded after the addition or the withdrawal of functionalities. We will base our approach on the definition of contracts expressed in various formalisms (e.g., first order logic, temporal logic, state automata) and we will propose a composition of these contracts.

The second challenge will be to implement design processes that maintain coherence between the various stages of modeling in a MDE approach of the applications, as well as maintaining coherence between the phases of modeling and implementation. To do so, we will design and implement tools that will enable traceability and coherence checking between models, as well as between models and the application at execution time.

Finally, we will introduce context information in the development process. At the modeling level, we will represent concepts, behavior and rules of adaptive systems to express adaptation abstraction. These models will be dynamic and connected to implementation levels at the computational level and they will consider context knowledge. The goal is to bridge the gap between the computational level and the domain level in adaptive systems by synchronization of models and implementations, but also by representation of such common knowledge.