An Architecture-based Adaptation Framework for Soft Real-Time Applications

Driven by the proliferation of mobile and pervasive computing, real-time systems are increasingly used in dynamic changing environments with variable user needs, hosting real-time applications ranging in number and nature over time. However, existing adaptation frameworks normally are incapable to cope with other competing and changing concerns. This paper proposes an architecture-based framework for managing real-time components’ dependence and lifecycle in an effective and uniform way. A real-time component runtime service is proposed here to maintain the global view, control the whole lifecycle of the components and keep existing real-time components' promised contracts in the face of run-time changes. This framework is designed to be easily extended with other constraint resolving policies as well as dependence descriptions languages. At end of this paper, the framework is tested from both adaptation and performance aspects by a simulated control application.