S-theory: A unified theory of multi-paradigm software development

Abstract

Many problems facing software engineers demand 'optimal' performance in multiple dimensions, such as computational overhead and development overhead. For these complex problems, designing an optimal solution based upon a single programming paradigm is not feasible. A more appropriate solution is to create a solution framework that embraces multiple programming paradigms, each of which is optimal for a well-defined region of the problem space. This paper proposes a theory for creating multi-paradigm software solutions that is inspired by two contributions from theoretical physics: model dependent realism and M-Theory. The proposed theoretical framework, which we call 'S-Theory', promotes the creation of actor-optimal solution frameworks, encourages technology reuse and identifies promising research directions. We use the field of sensor networks as a running example. © 2013 Springer-Verlag.