Appraising fairness in languages for distributed programming

The relations among various languages and models for distributed computation and various possible definitions of fairness are considered. Natural semantic criteria are presented which an acceptable notion of fairness should satisfy. These are then used to demonstrate differences among the basic models, the added power of the fairness notion, and the sensitivity of the fairness notion to irrelevant semantic interleavings of independent operations. These results are used to show that from the considerable variety of commonly used possibilities, only strong process fairness is appropriate forCSP if these criteria are adopted. We also show that under these criteria, none of the commonly used notions of fairness are fully aceptable for a model with an n-way synchronization mechanism. The notion of fairness most often mentioned for Ada is shown to be fully acceptable. For a model with nonblockingsend operations, some variants of common fairness definitions are appraised, and two are shown to satisfy the suggested criteria. Krzysztof R. Apt was born in 1949 in Poland. Received his Ph.D. in 1974 from Polish Academy of Sciences in Warsaw in mathematical logic. From 1974 until 1981 worked at various scientific institutions in the Netherlands and from 1981 until 1987 at C.N.R.S. in Paris, France. Spent 1985 as a visiting scientist at IBM Research Centre in Yorktown Heights, U.S.A. Currently holding an Endowed Professorship at the Department of Computer Sciences at the University of Texas at Austin; also a senior research scientist at the Centre for Mathematics and Computer Science in Amsterdam, the Netherlands. His research interests include program correctness and semantics, methodology of distributed computing, use of logic as a programming language and non-standard forms of reasoning. He has served on editorial boards of a number of journals and program committees of numerous conferences in computer science. Lectured in a dozen countries on four continents. Also, he has run two marathons and crossed Sumatra on a bicycle. Shmuel Katz received his B.A. in Mathematics and English Literature from U.C.L.A., and his M.Sc. and Ph.D. in Computer Science (1976) from the Weizmann Institute in Rehovot, Israel. From 1976 to 1981 he was a researcher at the IBM Israel Scientific Center. Presently, he is a Senior Lecturer in the Computer Science Department at the Technion in Haifa, Israel. In 1977–78, he visited for a year at the University of California, Berkeley, and in 1984–85 was at the University of Texas at Austin. He has also been a consultant for the MCC Software Technology Program. His research interests include the methodology of programming, specification methods, program verification and semantics, distributed programming, data structures, and programming languages. Nissim Francez received his B.A. in Mathematics and Philosophy from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem, and his M.Sc. and Ph.D. in computer science (1976) from the Weizmann Institute of Science, Rehovot, Israel. In 1976–77 he spent a postdoctoral year at Queen's university, Belfast, where he was introduced by C.A.R. Hoare to CSP. In 1977–78 he was an assistant professor at USC, Los Angeles. From 1978 he is with the Computer Science Department at the Technion. In 1982–83 he was on a sabbatical leave at IBM T.J. Watson Research Center. He has been a consultant for MCC's software technology program, working on multiparty activities in distributed systems. He had summer appointments in Harvard University, IBM T.J. Watson Research Center, Utrecht University, CWI (Amsterdam) and at MCC. He also served in several program committees. His research interests include program verification and the semantics of programming languages, mainly for concurrent and distributed programming. Is also interested in logic programming and recursive query evaluation and in compiler constration. He is the author of the first book onFairness. Unfortunately, he is incapable of Marathon running...     

Type theory and concurrency

This paper describes the use of an automated reasoning tool, the Nuprl system, to formalize Milner's Calculus of Communicating Systems (CCS). The goals of this work are two-fold: the first is to investigate the feasibility of using systems like Nuprl to handle the formal detail arising from reasoning about concurrency, while the second is to develop a framework in which various formalisms for reasoning about concurrency may be presented in an automated fashion. To these ends, an implementation in Nuprl of a formal theory of concurrency is described, an implementation of CCS in this mechanized semantic theory presented, and two means of analyzing CCS terms are investigated.     

Invariants and paradigms of concurrency theory

We introduce a new invariant semantics of concurrent systems which is a direct generalisation of the causal partial order semantics. Our new semantics overcomes some of the problems encountered when one uses causal partial orders alone. We discuss various aspects of the new invariant model. In particular, we outline how the new invariants can be generated by I-safe inhibitor Petri nets.     

Performance analysis of locking and optimistic concurrency control algorithms

New analytic models are presented which predict the maximum throughput of locking and optimistic concurrency control algorithms for a centralized database system. By making several simplifying assumptions, these models can be easily solved. The analytic results are tested against simulation and are shown to have an accuracy considerably better than some previously reported methods. The models are used to carry out a comparison between locking and optimistic control under stated assumptions. It is found that locking schemes consistently have higher maximum throughput than optimistic schemes.     

Efficient model checking for LTL with partial order snapshots

Certain behavioral properties of distributed systems are difficult to express in interleaving semantics, whereas they are naturally expressed in terms of partial orders of events or, equivalently, Mazurkiewicz traces. Two examples of such properties are serializability of a database and global snapshots of concurrent systems. Recently, a modest extension for LTL by an operator that expresses snapshots, has been proposed. It combines the ease of linear (interleaving) specification with this useful partial order concept. The new construct allows one to assert that a global snapshot appeared in the past, perhaps not in the observed execution sequence, but possibly in an equivalent one.     

Modeling concurrency with partial orders

Concurrency has been expressed variously in terms of formal languages (typically via the shuffle operator), partial orders, and temporal logic,inter alia. In this paper we extract from these three approaches a single hybrid approach having a rich language that mixes algebra and logic and having a natural class of models of concurrent processes. The heart of the approach is a notion of partial string derived from the view of a string as a linearly ordered multiset by relaxing the linearity constraint, thereby permitting partially ordered multisets orpomsets. Just as sets of strings form languages, so do sets of pomsets form processes. We introduce a number of operations useful for specifying concurrent processes and demonstrate their utility on some basic examples. Although none of the operations is particularly oriented to nets it is nevertheless possible to use them to express processes constructed as a net of subprocesses, and more generally as a system consisting of components. The general benefits of the approach are that it is conceptually straightforward, involves fewer artificial constructs than many competing models of concurrency, yet is applicable to a considerably wider range of types of systems, including systems with buses and ethernets, analog systems, and real-time systems.Revision of Some Constructions for Order-Theoretic Models of Concurrency [Ref. 1].     

实时数据库并发控制协议及其Petri网分析

该文提出一种适用于实时数据库的新可推测并发控制（New Speculative Concurrency Control,NSCC）协议。该协议在传统的SCC协议基础之上,进行一系列改进,避免了大量不必要的事务重启,提高了并发度。最后,通过Petri网理论验证其可行性和正确性。     

On equivalence-completions of fairness assumptions

The paper considers the treatment of fairness assumptions which arenot equivalence-robust, a central issue in relatinginterleaving semantics topartial order semantics. A notion ofcompletion is introduced and studied, and two specific completions are considered:maximal completion, which is easier to implement (shown by a broadcast bus implementation) but guarantees only weak liveness properties of programs using it; andminimal completion, which may be harder to implement but induces stronger liveness properties on programs using it. Some properties of completions are formulated. Finally, the impact of non-equivalence-robustness on compositionality with respect to separate fairness assumptions is considered.Work started during a visit of the first author to the Computer Science Department, Abo Akademi, Finland, July–August 1988, and continued during the first author's stay at MCC in 1989/90.     

Partial ordering models for concurrency can be defined operationally

Labelled rewriting systems are shown to be powerful enough for defining the semantics of concurrent systems in terms of partial orderings of events, even in the presence of non standard operators like N that is not expressible by means of concurrency and sequentialization. This contrasts with Pratt's claim.⁽¹⁾ The main operators proposed by Pratt are used here to construct terms denoting concurrent systems, the behavior of which consists of partially ordered multisets defined operationally.⁽²⁾ Fully abstractness of the denotational semantics as defined in Ref. 1 with respect to the operational one is finally proved.     

Contracts for concurrency

The SCOOP model extends the Eiffel programming language to provide support for concurrent programming. The model is based on the principles of Design by Contract. The semantics of contracts used in the original proposal (SCOOP_97) is not suitable for concurrent programming because it restricts parallelism and complicates reasoning about program correctness. This article outlines a new contract semantics which applies equally well in concurrent and sequential contexts and permits a flexible use of contracts for specifying the mutual rights and obligations of clients and suppliers while preserving the potential for parallelism. We argue that it is indeed a generalisation of the traditional correctness semantics. We also propose a proof technique for concurrent programs which supports proofs—similar to those for traditional non-concurrent programs—of partial correctness and loop termination in the presence of asynchrony. P. J. Brooke, R. F. Paige and Dong Jin Song     

Concurrent Logic and Automata Combined: A Semantics for Components

In this paper, we describe a true-concurrent hierarchical logic interpreted over concurrent automata. Concurrent automata constitute a special kind of asynchronous transition system (ATS) used for modelling the behaviour of components as understood in component-based software development. Here, a component-based system consists of several interacting components whereby each component manages calls to and from the component using ports to ensure encapsulation. Further, a component can be complex and made of several simpler interacting components. When a complex component receives a request through one of its ports, the port delegates the request to an internal component. Our logic allows us to describe the different views we can have on the system. For example, the overall component interactions, whether they occur sequentially, simultaneously or in parallel, and how each component internally manages the received requests (possibly expressed at different levels of detail). Using concurrent automata as an underlying formalism we guarantee that the expressiveness of the logic is preserved in the model. In future work, we plan to integrate our truly-concurrent approach into the Edinburgh Concurrency Workbench.     

基于多版本的安全实时并发控制协议

安全实时数据库必须同时满足安全性和实时性,然而这两者有时可能相互冲突.为了解决这种冲突,提出了基于多版本的安全实时并发控制协议.协议为每个数据对象提供两个版本:工作版本和只读版本,根据事务和数据对象的安全级为事务提供不同的数据版本,有效地解决了实时性与安全性之间的冲突,最后给出了协议的正确性证明.     

混合的实时嵌套事务并发控制协议

嵌套事务作为扩展事务模型的一种,提供了事务内部的并行性和更好的失败恢复选择,具有较为广泛的应用,然而却给事务并发控制带来了更高的复杂性,尤其在实时数据库中事务具有时间限制.针对实时嵌套事务模型,提出了一种混合并发控制协议,对同一事务树内的子事务采用锁协议,对不同事务树之间的事务采用基于动态调整串行化顺序的乐观并发控制协议,提高了事务的成功率,最后证明了协议的正确性.     

Common2 extended to stacks and unbounded concurrency

This paper extends Common2, the family of objects that implement and are wait-free implementable from 2 consensus objects, in two ways: First, the stack object is shown to be in the family, refuting a conjecture to the contrary [6]. Second, Common2 is investigated in the unbounded concurrency model, whereas until now it was considered only in an n-process model. We show that the fetch-and-add, test-and-set , and stack objects are in Common2 even with respect to this stronger notion of wait-free implementation. Our constructions rely on a wait-free implementation of immediate snapshots in the unbounded concurrency model, which was previously not known to be possible. The introduction of unbounded concurrency to the study of Common2 opens several directions of research: are there objects that have n-process implementations but are not unbounded concurrency implementable? We conjecture that swap is such an object. Additionally, the hope is that a queue impossibility proof, which eludes us in the n-process model, will be easier to establish in the unbounded concurrency model.     

Spatial-behavioral types for concurrency and resource control in distributed systems

We develop a notion of spatial-behavioral typing suitable to discipline concurrent interactions and resource usage in distributed object systems. Our type structure reflects a resource sensitive model, where a parallel composition type operator expresses resource independence, a sequential composition type operator expresses resource synchronization, and a type modality expresses resource ownership. We model the intended computational systems using a concurrent object calculus. Soundness of our type system is established using a logical relations technique, building on a interpretation of types as properties expressible in a spatial logic.     

Relating state-based and process-based concurrency through linear logic (full-version)

This paper has the purpose of reviewing some of the established relationships between logic and concurrency, and of exploring new ones.Concurrent and distributed systems are notoriously hard to get right. Therefore, following an approach that has proved highly beneficial for sequential programs, much effort has been invested in tracing the foundations of concurrency in logic. The starting points of such investigations have been various idealized languages of concurrent and distributed programming, in particular the well established state-transformation model inspired by Petri nets and multiset rewriting, and the prolific process-based models such as the π-calculus and other process algebras. In nearly all cases, the target of these investigations has been linear logic, a formal language that supports a view of formulas as consumable resources. In the first part of this paper, we review some of these interpretations of concurrent languages into linear logic and observe that, possibly modulo duality, they invariably target a small semantic fragment of linear logic that we call LV^obs.In the second part of the paper, we propose a new approach to understanding concurrent and distributed programming as a manifestation of logic, which yields a language that merges those two main paradigms of concurrency. Specifically, we present a new semantics for multiset rewriting founded on an alternative view of linear logic and specifically LV^obs. The resulting interpretation is extended with a majority of linear connectives into the language of ω-multisets. This interpretation drops the distinction between multiset elements and rewrite rules, and considerably enriches the expressive power of standard multiset rewriting with embedded rules, choice, replication, and more. Derivations are now primarily viewed as open objects, and are closed only to examine intermediate rewriting states. The resulting language can also be interpreted as a process algebra. For example, a simple translation maps process constructors of the asynchronous π-calculus to rewrite operators. The language of ω-multisets forms the basis for the security protocol specification language MSR 3. With relations to both multiset rewriting and process algebra, it supports specifications that are process-based, state-based, or of a mixed nature, with the potential of combining verification techniques from both worlds. Additionally, its logical underpinning makes it an ideal common ground for systematically comparing protocol specification languages.     

Fairness and the axioms of control predicates

Many recent axiomatic definitions for structured programming languages include control predicates,at(S), in(S), andafter(S), which are an abstraction of location counters. The usual axioms identify control locations so as to imply that no time (i.e., no state transition) is needed to pass from the end of one statement to the next, and in particular from the end of a loop body back to the test at the head of the loop. Here, an axiomatic framework for control predicates is examined. It is shown that if all the axioms are to be maintained with common representation mappings, there are difficult new requirements which need to be satisfied by an implementation for fair concurrent models of computation. Several approaches to resolving the difficulty are considered, and in particular it is suggested to replace some axioms of the formPQ byPeventually(Q), whereP andQ are control predicates, thereby separating control states previously identified.The North has receded, but the South has not yet arrived.-Reuven Miran, 42 Degrees in the Shade Every three lines intersect at a point, if the point is thick enough.-Folk theoremNote: A talk based on this paper was presented at the Colloquium on Temporal Logic and Specification, Altrincham, Cheshire, April 1987.C.R. Categories: D.3.1 [Programming languages] Formal definitions and theory: semantics; D..3.3 [Programming languages] Language constructs: control structures; F.3.1. [Logics and meanings of programs] Specifying and verifying and reasoning about programs.     

基于并发技术的Web Service的设计与研究

Web Service是SOA中最基本的元素,Web Service的质量影响了基于服务流程的各个方面.提出了用并发技术提高WebService质量的设想,讨论了WebService并发的模型,并对模型的并发效率进行了比较.在实现技术上提出了抽象资源层沣的概念,并以抽象资源层为线索,总结出了设计具有并发能力的Web Service的方法,该方法对于改造和开发企业级Web Set-vice有一定的适应性.     

多任务的异步并发在梯级AGC系统中的实现

探讨了实时条件下多任务的程序设计技术,并给出了实现方案与基本编程模型.针对并发程序设计并发性、共享性的特点,对引入多线程机制如何提高软件系统处理速度,以及可能带来的问题进行充分研究,并结合三峡梯级AGC工程应用实际找出了瓶颈及制约因素,提出了针对性的解决策略.实际运行验证表明,该方案充分利用了UNIX小型机的资源优势,有效提高系统整体性能,满足了AGC系统对实时性的要求.