Towards a flexible deployment of multi-cloud applications based on TOSCA and CAMP

Cloud Computing platforms offer diverse services and capabilities with own features. Hence, the provider services could be used by end users to compose a heterogeneous context of multiple cloud platforms in order to deploy their cloud applications made up of a set of modules, according to the best capabilities of the cloud providers. However, this is an ideal scenario, since the cloud platforms are being conducted in an isolated way by presenting many interoperability and portability restrictions, which complicate the integration of diverse provider services to achieve an heterogeneous deployment of multi-cloud applications. In this ongoing work, we present an approach based on model transformation to deploy multi-cloud applications by reusing standardization e orts related to the management and deployment of cloud applications. Specifically, using mechanisms speci ed by both standards, TOSCA and CAMP, we propose a methodology to describe the topology and distribution of modules of a cloud application and to deploy the interconnected modules over heterogeneous clouds. We illustrate our idea using a running example.Work partially supported by projects TIN2012-35669, funded by Spanish Ministry MINECO, FEDER; P11-TIC-7659 funded by Andalusian Gov; FP7-610531 SeaClouds funded by EU; and Universidad de Málaga. Campus de Excelencia Internacional Andalucía Tech

Intensity fluctuations in bimodal micropillar lasers enhanced by quantum-dot gain competition

We investigate correlations between orthogonally polarized cavity modes of a bimodal micropillar laser with a single layer of self-assembled quantum dots in the active region. While one emission mode of the microlaser demonstrates a characteristic s-shaped input-output curve, the output intensity of the second mode saturates and even decreases with increasing injection current above threshold. Measuring the photon auto-correlation function g^{(2)}(\tau) of the light emission confirms the onset of lasing in the first mode with g^{(2)}(0) approaching unity above threshold. In contrast, strong photon bunching associated with super-thermal values of g^{(2)}(0) is detected for the other mode for currents above threshold. This behavior is attributed to gain competition of the two modes induced by the common gain material, which is confirmed by photon crosscorrelation measurements revealing a clear anti-correlation between emission events of the two modes. The experimental studies are in excellent qualitative agreement with theoretical studies based on a microscopic semiconductor theory, which we extend to the case of two modes interacting with the common gain medium. Moreover, we treat the problem by an extended birth-death model for two interacting modes, which reveals, that the photon probability distribution of each mode has a double peak structure, indicating switching behavior of the modes for the pump rates around threshold.Comment: 11 pages, 5 figures, submitted to Phys. Rev.

Pattern Views: Concept and Tooling for Interconnected Pattern Languages

Patterns describe proven solutions for recurring problems. Typically, patterns in a particular domain are interrelated and organized in pattern languages. As real-world problems often require patterns of multiple domains, different pattern languages have to be considered to address these problems. However, cross-domain knowledge about how patterns of different languages relate to each other is either hidden in individual pattern descriptions or not documented at all. This makes it difficult to identify relevant patterns across pattern languages. Therefore, we introduce a concept and tooling that enables to capture patterns and their relations across pattern languages for a particular problem context

Workplace Mobbing

Mobbing odnosno zlostavljanje na radnome mjestu predstavlja neprijateljsku i neetičnu komunikaciju, koja je sustavno usmjerena od jednoga ili više pojedinaca prema, uglavnom, jednom pojedincu, koji je zbog mobbinga gurnut u poziciju u kojoj je bespomoćan ili se ne može obraniti te držan u njoj s pomoću stalnih zlostavljačkih (mobinških) aktivnosti. U članku je obrađeno nekoliko bitnih značajki zlostavljanja: ponašanja karakteristična za zlostavljača, organizacijski uzroci pojave, konflikt u poduzeću kao njegov povod, žrtva, izvanorganizacijski čimbenici njegova razvoja te posljedice zlostavljanja. Suvremeni poslovni svijet je kompleksan, dinamičan i promjenljiv te zahtijeva sve veću umješnost i sposobnost prilagodbe. Sukobi su dakako neizbježan dio svake organizacije, ali ih je menadžment dužan pravodobno prepoznati i njima upravljati radi sprječavanja štetnih posljedica za produktivnost i troškove poduzeća, radi zaštite zaposlenika te suzbijanja psihičkih i tjelesnih poremećaja koji nastaju psihičkim nasiljem i iskrivljenim oblikom ponašanja kakav je mobbing. On je problem suvremenog društva, nov i u nas nedostatno istražen oblik kršenja ljudskih prava. Zbiva se uglavnom na psihološkoj razini, negativno utječe na zdravlje i život, kvalitetu rada, proizvodnju i pružanje usluga, produktivnost i profitabilnost te značajno utječe na ekonomske gubitke u zajednici. Zlostavljanje na radnome mjestu treba rješavati multidisciplinarno: inicirajući zajedničke aktivnosti zaposlenika i uprave, uključujući medicinske stručnjake, pravnike, pa i društvenu zajednicu u cjelini. Što se u organizaciji više teži izvrsnosti koja se temelji na povjerenju i radnoj etici, to je veća vjerojatnost njegovog sprječavanja i rješavanja.Workplace mobbing is a hostile and unethical communication, systematically aimed from one or more individuals towards mostly one individual, who are forced into a helpless position and are held in it by constant bullying. This article describes some of the most important characteristics of mobbing: offensive behaviour, organizational and non-organizational causes of this behaviour, the victim, and the consequences. Modern business environment is complex, dynamic, volatile, and requires better ability to adjust. Constant changes are a part of organizational reality, but they also produce an ideal environment for all kinds of conflicts. Conflicts are inevitable in every organization, but the task of its management is to identify them and resolve before they affect the workforce, productivity, and costs. The idea is to avert psychological abuse and aberrant behaviour such as mobbing that may cause physical and mental disorders. Mobbing is a problem of the modern society; as a violation of human rights it is relatively new and unrecognised in Croatia. Abuse is mostly psychological; it affects the victim’s health and life, quality of work, productivity, profitability, and may lead to significant economic losses in the community. Mobbing can be averted by joint forces that would involve employees and management, medical and legal professionals, and even community as a whole. The more an organization pursues excellence based on trust and business ethics, the higher the probability that mobbing will be averted or stopped

Service Orientation and the Smart Grid state and trends

The energy market is undergoing major changes, the most notable of which is the transition from a hierarchical closed system toward a more open one highly based on a “smart” information-rich infrastructure. This transition calls for new information and communication technologies infrastructures and standards to support it. In this paper, we review the current state of affairs and the actual technologies with respect to such transition. Additionally, we highlight the contact points between the needs of the future grid and the advantages brought by service-oriented architectures.

Engineering a Highly Scalable Object-aware Process Management Engine Using Distributed Microservices

Scalability of information systems has been a research topic for many years and is as relevant as ever with the dramatic increases in digitization of business processes and data. This also applies to process-aware information systems, most of which are currently incapable of scaling horizontally, i.e., over multiple servers. This paper presents the design science artifact that resulted from engineering a highly scalable process management system relying on the object-aware process man-agement paradigm. The latter allows for distributed process execution by conceptually encapsulating process logic and data into multiple in-teracting objects that may be processed concurrently. These objects, in turn, are represented by individual microservices at run-time, which can be hosted transparently across entire server clusters. We present mea-surement data that evaluates the scalability of the artifact on a compute cluster, demonstrating that the current prototypical implementation of the run-time engine can handle very large numbers of users and process instances concurrently in single-case mechanism experiments with large amounts of simulated user input. Finally, the development of scalable process execution engines will further the continued maturation of the data-centric business process management field

Enforcement from the inside: Improving quality of business in process management

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