Adaptive middleware in go - a software architecture-based approach

Abstract

Adaptive middleware is essential for developing distributed systems in several applications domains. The design and implementation of this kind of middleware, however, it is still a challenge due to general adaptation issues, such as When to adapt? Where to include the adaptation code? What to adapt?, and How to guarantee safe adaptations?. Current solutions commonly face these challenges at the implementation level and do not focus on the safety aspects of the adaptation. This paper proposes a holistic solution implemented in Go programming language for developing adaptive middleware centred on the adoption of software architecture principles combined with lightweight use of formalisms. Software architecture concepts work as an enabling approach for structuring and adapting the middleware. Meanwhile, the formalisation helps in providing some guarantees before and during the middleware execution. The proposed solution is evaluated by implementing an adaptive middleware and comparing its performance against existing middleware systems. As shown in the experimental evaluation, the proposed solution enables us to design and implement safe adaptive middleware systems without compromising their performance.