Self-star Properties in Complex Information Systems: Conceptual and Practical Foundations

by Maarten van Steen (Editor), Ozalp Babaoglu (Editor), Mark Jelasity (Editor)

Information systems can be complex due to numerous factors including scale, decentralization, heterogeneity, mobility, dynamism, bugs and failures. Depl- ing, operating and maintaining such systems can be not only very di?cult, but also very costly. A ?urry of recent activity has been directed at this pr- lem, and future information systems are envisioned as self-con?guring, se- organizing,self-managingandself-repairing.Collectively,wecalltheseproperties self- properties. This book is a “spin-o?” of a by-invitation-only Bertinoro workshop on se- propertiesincomplexsystemswhichwasheldinsummer2004inBertinoro,Italy. The Self-star workshop brought together researchers and practitioners from d- ferent disciplines and with di?erent backgrounds to discuss complex information systems.Thethemeoftheworkshopwastoidentifytheconceptualandpractical foundationsformodeling,analyzingandachievingself- propertiesindistributed and networked systems. Partly based on these discussions, we solicited papers from the workshop participants and a set of invitees for this book. We sought original contributions in which authors explicitly take a position concerningrequirements,usefulness,potentialandlimitations oftechnologies for self- properties of complex systems. This position needed to be founded on - search results that were put clearly in context with respect to the position sta- ment. We strongly encouraged visionary statements, thought-provoking ideas, and exploratory results that will help the reader form her or his own opinions on the importance of self- properties in current and future complex information systems.

Paperback

First published June 1, 2005