A Service Request Description Language

Abstract

To meet the new requirements of growing computer networks the client-server model has to be improved by new concepts with encreased functionality. Service management in distributed systems is realized by a service trading concept. This paper presents a language given in Backus-Naur Form which enables specification of service requests. First, a matching criteria is specified as conditioned Boolean expression in order to evaluate appropriate service offers. Additionally, a selection criteria can be used to yield the most suitable service. To limit the scope of a search it is possible to specify policies and search constraints on service properties which restrict the search on particular trading objects. The Service Request Description Language presented here is related to the ANSAware trader to increase its functionality by giving means for service searching and selecting