Non-hierarchical Dynamic Protocol Composition in Jgroup/ARM
Hein Meling · 2006
Protocol composition is a common approach to structure generic protocols used by networked applications, and typically a vertically layered approach is taken. This paper presents an alternative approach, where the protocol composition is a weakly-coupled set of protocol modules organized in a non-hierarchical structure. Protocol modules are dynamically constructed at runtime. The approach is designed for systems that involves multiple communicating entities and multicast style interactions are supported, making the approach suitable for building reliable network applications. The main advantage of the approach is that modules in the same composition communicate by direct interaction, whereas other frameworks typically use a vertically layered protocol stack, forcing all messages/events to pass through all intermediate layers introducing unnecessary delays. 1