A Conceptual Framework for System Fault Tolerance
Walter L. Heimerdinger, Charles B. Weinstock · 1992
: A major problem in transitioning fault tolerance practices to the practitioner community is a lack of a common view of what fault tolerance is, and how it can help in the design of reliable computer systems. This document takes a step towards making fault tolerance more understandable by proposing a conceptual framework. The framework provides a consistent vocabulary for fault tolerance concepts, discusses how systems fail, describes commonly used mechanisms for making systems fault tolerant, and provides some rules for developing fault tolerant systems. 1 Introduction One of the major problems in transitioning fault tolerance practices to the practitioner community is a lack of a common view of exactly what fault tolerance is, and how it can help in the design of reliable systems. One step towards making fault tolerance more understandable is to provide a conceptual framework. The purpose of this document is to propose such a framework. This document begins with a discussion of wh...