Deriving Specifications of Dependable Systems: toward a Method

This paper proposes a method for deriving formal specifications of systems. To accomplish this task we pass through a non trivial number of steps, concepts and tools where the first one, the most important, is the concept of method itself, since we realized that computer science has a proliferation of languages but very few methods. We also propose the idea of Layered Fault Tolerant Specification (LFTS) to make the method extensible to dependable systems. The principle is layering the specification, for the sake of clarity, in (at least) two different levels, the first one for the normal behavior and the others (if more than one) for the abnormal. The abnormal behavior is described in terms of an Error Injector (EI) which represents a model of the erroneous interference coming from the environment. This structure has been inspired by the notion of idealized fault tolerant component but the combination of LFTS and EI using rely guarantee thinking to describe interference can be considered one of the main contributions of this work. The progress toward this method and the way to layer specifications has been made experimenting on the Transportation and the Automotive Case Studies of the DEPLOY project.Comment: Published in "12th European Workshop on Dependable Computing, EWDC 2009, Toulouse : France (2009)

Issues about the Adoption of Formal Methods for Dependable Composition of Web Services

Web Services provide interoperable mechanisms for describing, locating and invoking services over the Internet; composition further enables to build complex services out of simpler ones for complex B2B applications. While current studies on these topics are mostly focused - from the technical viewpoint - on standards and protocols, this paper investigates the adoption of formal methods, especially for composition. We logically classify and analyze three different (but interconnected) kinds of important issues towards this goal, namely foundations, verification and extensions. The aim of this work is to individuate the proper questions on the adoption of formal methods for dependable composition of Web Services, not necessarily to find the optimal answers. Nevertheless, we still try to propose some tentative answers based on our proposal for a composition calculus, which we hope can animate a proper discussion

On Modelling and Analysis of Dynamic Reconfiguration of Dependable Real-Time Systems

This paper motivates the need for a formalism for the modelling and analysis of dynamic reconfiguration of dependable real-time systems. We present requirements that the formalism must meet, and use these to evaluate well established formalisms and two process algebras that we have been developing, namely, Webpi and CCSdp. A simple case study is developed to illustrate the modelling power of these two formalisms. The paper shows how Webpi and CCSdp represent a significant step forward in modelling adaptive and dependable real-time systems.Comment: Presented and published at DEPEND 201

The challenge of translating Brian Friel's translations

Introduction: «Translations is a modern classic» (Daily Telegraph). «[...] The most deeply involved with Ireland but also the most universal: haunting and hard, lyrical and erudite, bitter and forgiving, both praise and lament» (Sunday Times). In our essay we introduce Brian Friel’s Translations starting from some historical data and we move on to an analysis of the major themes presented in the play. Because translation holds a special place among them, we pay specific attention to the concept of translation, as Friel sees it: as metaphor of ‘Irishness’. Later on, we unfold our strategy in translating an extract of this work, explaining in as much detail as possible why we adopt the basic principle of Skopos theory. Firstly, we present the unusual nature of the play, which ‘plays’ with Irish and English on stage. Secondly, we describe our purpose, which is to maintain the original setting, in the sense that we do not ‘acculturate’ it. We feel that it is important to keep English as the theme of the play, changing of course the medium, since we translate it using the Italian and the Greek language. Finally, we incorporate our individual translations with some commentary

Subverting the narrative of the Lampedusa borderscape

With this article I wish to challenge the concept of ‘crisis’, commonly associated with the arrival of irregularized migrants to the island of Lampedusa, by showing how this conception is usually the result of a fabrication and spectacle to which migrants become subjected, fuelling a ‘moral panic’ difficult to overcome. The understanding and representation of migrants as ‘carriers of crisis’ has inevitably undermined their dignity and rights as individuals. As a counter-narrative, this article explores a series of acts of resistance revolving around the issue of migration, where Lampedusa plays a central role, promoting the autonomy of migrants that is challenging the order of a securitized Europe. Through analyses of the grassroots documentary and theatre projects On the Bride’s Side (Angliaro et al., 2014) and Queens of Syria (Fedda, 2013), this article finally explores the possibility of perceiving art about migrant experiences as a domain of struggle, through acts that I have defined as ‘aesthetics of subversion’, where those who are normally depicted as ‘imperceptible bodies’ become ‘subjects of power’, the power of subverting the narrative around their journey, their past and their desires for the future

Spaces of Visibility for the Migrants of Lampedusa: The Counter Narrative of the Aesthetic Discourse

Political, legal, and media discourse around ‘boat-migrants’ arriving in Lampedusa share a tendency to focus on an unnamed and anonymous mass of people in order to build and sustain a Border Spectacle revolving around immigration to Italy. In this context, where very little space is usually left to individual migrant voices, this article challenges this common understanding of immigration to Lampedusa by showing a different side of the story, a story told by the real actors of the Mediterranean passage, the migrants themselves, who, by relying on the realm of aesthetics, have managed to gain visibility and to become ‘subjects of power.

Objects, Debris and Memory of the Mediterranean Passage: Porto M in Lampedusa

This article will consider the current migratory passage in the Mediterranean towards Lampedusa with a focus on memorial objects. The arrival of refugees’ boats, often victims of shipwrecks, on the island of Lampedusa, over the past decades, has produced a large quantity of ‘debris’, which the locals stored in improvised ‘cemeteries’ of boats that were also used as the island’s landfills. Within the island, the local Collective Askavusa has played a central role in rescuing whatever they could from the wrecked boats, including private photographs, shoes, pots, religious texts and other personal items that accompany the migrants on their often deadly passage of the Mediterranean. We do not know if the owners of these objects survived the journey. However, they have come to serve as material testimonies to a continuing perilous global transit, which has exposed the inadequacies of European and International policies that continue to illegalize the right of refugees to move and survive. Askavusa has not simply collected the surviving objects, it has created a space called Porto M, where the objects are displayed to the public, in order to preserve something tangible from the often traumatic memory of the passage