Read more
In distributed computing systems-the software for networks-a system may have a huge number of components resulting in a high level of complexity. That and issues such as fault-tolerance, security, system management, and exploitation of concurrency make the development of complex distributed systems a challenge. The Isis Toolkit has become one of the most successful approaches for building reliable distributed software since its release in 1987. Commercially available since 1990, Isis is used in hundreds of settings, including the New York Stock Exchange, the Electronic Stock Exchange of Switzerland, the data acquisition system of the CERN high-energy physics particle accelerator, VLSI fabrication control systems, the Iridium telecommunication system, database applications at the World Bank, and an Arctic weather environment monitoring system. Isis is also widely used for instructional purposes.
This book comprises papers that document Isis and describe its important applications. Many of these are previously unpublished papers that give a broad overview of Isis, provide details of the underlying protocols and theory, and discuss the best ways to exploit Isis features in real applications. This volume will be of use to practitioners developing Isis-based applications, to instructors using Isis in classroom settings, and to researchers who want a single reference source for this important approach to distributed computing.
List of contents
1. Introduction (Kenneth P. Birman and Robbert van Renesse).
I: FUNDAMENTALS.
2. The Process Group Approach to Reliable Distributed Computing (Kenneth P. Birman).
3. Causal Controversy at Le Mont St.-Michel (Robbert van Renesse).
4. RPC Considered Inadequate (Kenneth P. Birman and Robbert van Renesse).
5. Exploiting Virtual Synchrony in Distributed Systems (Kenneth P. Birman and Thomas Joseph).
6. Virtual Synchrony Model (Kenneth P. Birman).
II: REDESIGN.
7. Design Alternatives for Process Group Membership and Multicast (Kenneth P. Birman, Robert Cooper, Barry Gleeson).
8. The Horus System (Robbert van Renesse, Kenneth P. Birman, Robert Cooper, Brad Glade, and Patrick Stephenson).
9. Integrating Security in a Group-Oriented Distributed System (Michael Reiter, Kenneth P. Birman, Na Li Gong).
10. High Availability in a Real-Time System (Carlos Almeida, Brad Glade, Keith Marzullo, and Robbert van Renesse).
III: PROTOCOLS.
11. Reliable Communication in the Presence of Failures (Kenneth P. Birman and Thomas Joseph).
12. Lightweight Causal and Atomic Group Multicast (Kenneth P. Birman, Andre Schiper, and Pat Stephenson).
13. Consistent Process Membership in Asynchronous Environments (Aleta Ricciardi and Kenneth P. Birman).
14. Efficient Broadcast Primitives in Asynchronous Distributed Systems (Frank Schmuck).
15. Light-Weight Process Groups in the Isis System (Bradford B. Glade, Kenneth P. Birman, Robert C.B. Cooper, and Robbert van Renesse).
IV: TOOLS AND APPLICATIONS.
16. Using the Isis Resource Manager for Distributed, Fault-Tolerant Computing (Timothy A. Clark and Kenneth P. Birman).
17. The Design and Implementation of Meta (Mark Wood and Keith Marzullo).
18. Paratex: An Environment for Parallel Programming in Distributed Systems (Ozalp Babaogul, Lorenzo Alvisi, Alessandro Amoroso, Renzo Davoli, and Luigi Alberto Giachini).
19. IMIS: A Distributed Query and Report Formatting System (T. Anthony Allen, William Sheppard, and Steve Condon).
20. Distributed Programming with Asynchronous Ordered Channels in Distributed ML (Robert Cooper and Clifford Krumvieda).
21. The Isis Project: Real experience with a fault tolerant programming system (Kenneth P. Birman and Robert Cooper).
Bibliography.
Index.
About the author
Ken Birman is a professor in the Department of Computer Science at Cornell University. Robbert Van Renesse is the author of Reliable Distributed Computing with the Isis Toolkit, published by Wiley.
