Dynamic Adaptation of Data Distribution Policies in a Shared Data Space System

摘要

Increasing demands for interconnectivity, adaptivity and flexibility are leading to distributed component-based systems (DCBS) where components may dynamically join and leave a system at run-time. Our research is aimed at the development of an architecture for middleware for DCBS such that the extra-functional properties of resulting systems can be easily tailored to different requirements. To this end, we proposed an architecture based on the shared data space paradigm. This architecture provides a suite of distribution strategies supporting different application usage patterns. We showed that using different distribution strategies for different usage patterns improved overall performance. As is the case with other middleware for DCBS, the configuration of the selected distribution policies was fixed before run-time. Consequently, these systems cannot adapt to changes in usage patterns that may be due to the joining of leaving of the components in the system. In this paper, we propose a mechanism for the dynamic adaptation of distribution policies to the evolving behaviour of applications. This architecture improves over existing architectures for distributed shared data spaces by providing a mechanism for self-management. We experimentally demonstrate the benefits that may be gained by dynamic adaptation of distribution policies.