Structuring reflective middleware using meta-information management: the Meta-ORB approach and prototypes
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Data
2004
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Resumo
Reflection is now an established technique for achieving
dynamic adaptability of middleware platforms. It provides
a clean and comprehensive way to access the internals
of a platform implementation, allowing its customisation
in order to achieve the best performance and adequacy
under given operation environments and user requirements.
In addition, the use of a runtime component
model for the design of the internal platform structure facilitates
the identification of the elements to be adapted, as
all platform aspects are built in terms of components. The
major limitation of this approach, however, is related to the
multitude of aspects that make up a middleware platform,
together with the requirement of keeping platform consistency
after adaptations take place. This paper presents the
results of ongoing research contributing to reduce this limitation.
The approach is based on the use of a common
meta-model, together with meta-information techniques to
provide a uniform way to specify and manipulate platform
configurations. Both platform configuration and runtime
adaptation are always specified using a small number of
building blocks defined in the meta-model. The paper also
describes the overall architecture of the Meta-ORB platform,
which demonstrates this approach, and presents its
two implementations: a proof-of-concept prototype written
in Python, and a Java-based implementation aimed at
supporting mobile devices. The results are also evaluated
from a quantitative perspective, according to the requirements
of multimedia applications, one of the major areas
of application of reflective middleware.
Descrição
Palavras-chave
Reflective middleware, Meta-information management, Dynamic reconfiguration
Citação
COSTA, Fábio Moreira; SANTOS, Bruno da Silva. Structuring reflective middleware using meta-information management: the Meta-ORB approach and prototypes. Journal of the Brazilian Computer Society, Porto Alegre, v. 10, n. 1, p. 43-58, 2004.