Modelling and analyzing adaptive self-assembling strategies with Maude

Building adaptive systems with predictable emergent behavior is a challenging task and it is becoming a critical need. The research community has accepted the challenge by introducing approaches of various nature: from software architectures, to programming paradigms, to analysis techniques. We recently proposed a conceptual framework for adaptation centered around the role of control data. In this paper we show that it can be naturally realized in a reflective logical language like Maude by using the Reflective Russian Dolls model. Moreover, we exploit this model to specify, validate and analyse a prominent example of adaptive system: robot swarms equipped with self-assembly strategies. The analysis exploits the statistical model checker PVeStA

Adaptive development and maintenance of user-centric software systems

A software system cannot be developed without considering the various facets of its environment. Stakeholders – including the users that play a central role – have their needs, expectations, and perceptions of a system. Organisational and technical aspects of the environment are constantly changing. The ability to adapt a software system and its requirements to its environment throughout its full lifecycle is of paramount importance in a constantly changing environment. The continuous involvement of users is as important as the constant evaluation of the system and the observation of evolving environments. We present a methodology for adaptive software systems development and maintenance. We draw upon a diverse range of accepted methods including participatory design, software architecture, and evolutionary design. Our focus is on user-centred software systems

The challenge of management of multidimensional enterprises analysed from a logo-poietic perspective

The challenge to multidimensional farm management is analysed and discussed from the perspective of the farm enterprise, explored within a logo-poietic framework as a self-organising system/network. In conclusion, development of management of multidimensional farming takes: a reconstruction of the values, ideas, and meaning around which the farm enterprises are organised, a new way of increase of nonredundant complexity, shifting from dimension reduction to contextualisation, and a development of interactive relationships that facilitate network building of multidimensional farming

Extending, broadening and rethinking existing research on transfer of training

Research on transfer of training has a long history, with thousands of empirical studies since the 1950s investigating whether, and under which conditions, knowledge and skills acquired during training are subsequently used in the work environment (see reviews by Baldwin and Ford, 1988, Blume et al., 2010 and Burke and Hutchins, 2007). The generation of such an abundance of research can be linked to organisations’ fundamental and ongoing concern to ensure that their employees possess the necessary knowledge and skills from their employer to maintain a competitive advantage and thrive economically. Training and development is, however, extremely costly to organisations, which has created the need to determine the effectiveness of training, and the conditions under which transfer of training is optimal. A recent overview of “what really matters” for successful transfer of training (Grossman & Salas, 2011), aimed at a training and development readership, summarized the most influential variables emerging from this vast body of research. Based on the expectation that the list of factors which may contribute to influence transfer could always be extended and that it would be impractical to incorporate every single factor in research designs, the authors recommended a shift in future research towards deeper investigations of the conditions under which selected variables are more or less influential in their relationship with training. This Special Issue contributes to this important research agenda and extends it further through the inclusion of a diverse collection of conceptual contributions and reviews, from several scientific disciplines, a plurality of theoretical perspectives and a range of methodological approaches. Expanding the theoretical grounding underpinning empirical work on transfer of training and scrutinizing existing conceptualizations of the notion of transfer is timely in light of widespread concerns from organisations about minimal return on investment in training, and repeated evidence in the transfer of training literature of an enduring “transfer problem”. The aim of this article is to explore the value of extending, broadening and rethinking existing research on transfer of training. The benefits of extending research on transfer of training is considered first, through examining how the contributions of this Special Issue add to the existing literature on transfer of training, and the implications of the new insights for addressing the “transfer problem”. How transfer of training research could be broadened, thus enriched, through incorporating ideas from recent literature on transfer of learning is considered next. Finally, proposals to rethink transfer as boundary crossing from an activity theory perspective are scrutinized for their potential to better understand the learning that takes place at the boundaries of training and work environments. The article concludes by elaborating on the conceptual value of a refocus on ‘transfer of learning from training’ within a perspective of adaptive learning, and a call for cross-fertilisation with the extensive theory grounded literatures on transfer of learning and boundary crossing

Implementing fault tolerant applications using reflective object-oriented programming

Abstract: Shows how reflection and object-oriented programming can be used to ease the implementation of classical fault tolerance mechanisms in distributed applications. When the underlying runtime system does not provide fault tolerance transparently, classical approaches to implementing fault tolerance mechanisms often imply mixing functional programming with non-functional programming (e.g. error processing mechanisms). The use of reflection improves the transparency of fault tolerance mechanisms to the programmer and more generally provides a clearer separation between functional and non-functional programming. The implementations of some classical replication techniques using a reflective approach are presented in detail and illustrated by several examples, which have been prototyped on a network of Unix workstations. Lessons learnt from our experiments are drawn and future work is discussed

UML-F: A Modeling Language for Object-Oriented Frameworks

The paper presents the essential features of a new member of the UML language family that supports working with object-oriented frameworks. This UML extension, called UML-F, allows the explicit representation of framework variation points. The paper discusses some of the relevant aspects of UML-F, which is based on standard UML extension mechanisms. A case study shows how it can be used to assist framework development. A discussion of additional tools for automating framework implementation and instantiation rounds out the paper.Comment: 22 pages, 10 figure

Modelling and analyzing adaptive self-assembling strategies with Maude

Building adaptive systems with predictable emergent behavior is a challenging task and it is becoming a critical need. The research community has accepted the challenge by introducing approaches of various nature: from software architectures, to programming paradigms, to analysis techniques. We recently proposed a conceptual framework for adaptation centered around the role of control data. In this paper we show that it can be naturally realized in a reflective logical language like Maude by using the Reflective Russian Dolls model. Moreover, we exploit this model to specify, validate and analyse a prominent example of adaptive system: robot swarms equipped with self-assembly strategies. The analysis exploits the statistical model checker PVeStA

Shakespeare Burlesque and the Performing Self

This paper argues that Victorian Shakespeare burlesques reveal an alternate literary history: a movement away from private, novelistic consciousness toward collaborative performance. Many materialist scholars fault post-Romantic critics for casting Shakespeare as a psychological realist and reading his plays as if they were novels. The burlesque treatment of Hamlet’s soliloquies, however, suggests a contrary trajectory, challenging the equation of Shakespearean character with psychological reflection. Rather than inaugurating a tradition of interiority, Hamlet’s soliloquies generate social speech in works like Gilbert’s Rosencrantz and Guildenstern, inviting audience participation. The burlesque imperative also inflects novels like Dickens’s Great Expectations, turning the internal debate of the canonical literary self into the public dispute of populist entertainment

Two Decades of Maude

This paper is a tribute to José Meseguer, from the rest of us in the Maude team, reviewing the past, the present, and the future of the language and system with which we have been working for around two decades under his leadership. After reviewing the origins and the language's main features, we present the latest additions to the language and some features currently under development. This paper is not an introduction to Maude, and some familiarity with it and with rewriting logic are indeed assumed.Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech