Eliminating mismatching connections between components by adopting an agent-based approach

During component composition, mismatches may occur on different aspects, such as interaction behaviors between components and features imposed by architectural styles. In this paper, we studied architectural mismatches related to connecting components using a specified architectural style, which implies that the connections supported by components may be incompatible with the connection supposed by the architectural style. First, we formalized components involved in different architectural styles in the pi-calculus. Next, we studied the formal foundation of the interconnectivity between components to exploit under what situation two heterogeneous components are possible to interconnect together properly. Then, we described an adaptor-based solution for composing components supporting different architectural styles by introducing the notation of negative component. In the end of this paper, we presented an agent-based implementation for the solution, in which agents are used to wrap components and can automatically transform messages specific to one architectural style into messages specific to another style by using architectural style-specific knowledge that agents possess.

[1]  Feng Chen,et al.  ABC/ADL: An ADL Supporting Component Composition , 2002, ICFEM.

[2]  Timothy W. Finin,et al.  KQML as an agent communication language , 1994, CIKM '94.

[3]  Rogério de Lemos,et al.  Tolerating Architectural Mismatches , 2002 .

[4]  David Garlan,et al.  Architectural Mismatch: Why Reuse Is So Hard , 1995, IEEE Softw..

[5]  Antonio Brogi,et al.  Systematic Component Adaptation , 2002, Electron. Notes Theor. Comput. Sci..

[6]  Michael Wooldridge,et al.  Introduction to multiagent systems , 2001 .

[7]  Paola Inverardi,et al.  Uncovering Architectural Mismatch in Component Behavior , 1999, Sci. Comput. Program..

[8]  Barry Boehm,et al.  Detecting architectural mismatches during systems composition , 1998 .

[9]  Peyman Oreizy,et al.  Reuse of Off-the-Shelf Components in C2-Style Architectures , 1997, Proceedings of the (19th) International Conference on Software Engineering.

[10]  Daniel M. Yellin,et al.  Protocol specifications and component adaptors , 1997, TOPL.

[11]  David Garlan,et al.  A formal basis for architectural connection , 1997, TSEM.

[12]  Robin Milner,et al.  A Calculus of Mobile Processes, II , 1992, Inf. Comput..

[13]  Barry Boehm,et al.  Composing heterogeneous software architectures , 1996 .

[14]  Mary Shaw,et al.  Software architecture - perspectives on an emerging discipline , 1996 .

[15]  David Garlan,et al.  Architectural Mismatch or Why it's hard to build systems out of existing parts , 1995, 1995 17th International Conference on Software Engineering.

[16]  Nenad Medvidovic,et al.  Component-based perspective on software mismatch detection and resolution , 2000, IEE Proc. Softw..