Predictably Dependable Computing Systems (esprit Basic Research Series)

Systems engineers are increasingly having to deal with the problem of how to make the process of designing and constructing dependable computing systems much more predictable and cost-effective. The great challenge about dependability is that it is a systems issue, since virtually all aspects of a computing system, and of the means by which it was specified, designed and constructed, can affect the system's overall dependability. This book explores links, and gaps, between topics that are often investigated separately, but whose interactions can be of considerable relevance to issues of overall system dependability. It contains material on all four of the main topics that are crucial to the successful production of dependable computing systems namely: fault prevention, fault tolerance, fault removal, and fault forecasting. Particular emphasis is placed on the problems of real-time and distributed computing systems. This book provides up to date information about the latest research on these topics from a team made up of many of Europe's leading researchers - it is based on the work of two successive major ESPRIT Basic Research Projects on Predictably Dependable Computing Systems. These projects lasted over six years in total, and each involved approximately forty researchers at any one time. The book contains a carefully edited selection from among the over two hundred published papers produced by the PDCS projects and provides a good general overview of the work of the two projects, as well as coverage of most of the projects' major research achievements. Front Matter....Pages i-xix Front Matter....Pages 1-1 Dependability — Its Attributes, Impairments and Means....Pages 3-18 Back Matter....Pages 19-24 Front Matter....Pages 25-26 Analysis of Safety Requirements for Process Control Systems....Pages 27-40 Real-Time System Scheduling....Pages 41-52 The Time-Triggered Approach to Real-Time System Design....Pages 53-66 Software Measurement: A Necessary Scientific Basis....Pages 67-78 Back Matter....Pages 79-84 Front Matter....Pages 85-86 From Recovery Blocks to Concurrent Atomic Actions....Pages 87-101 Definition and Analysis of Hardware-and-Software Fault-Tolerant Architectures....Pages 103-122 Failure Mode Assumptions and Assumption Coverage....Pages 123-140 Rational Design of Multiple-Redundant Systems: Adjudication and Fault Treatment....Pages 141-154 Dynamic Adjustment of Dependability and Efficiency in Fault-Tolerant Software....Pages 155-172 Designing Secure and Reliable Applications using Fragmentation-Redundancy-Scattering: an Object-Oriented Approach....Pages 173-188 Implementing Fault-Tolerant Applications Using Reflective Object-Oriented Programming....Pages 189-208 The PDCS Implementation of MARS Hardware and Software....Pages 209-224 Back Matter....Pages 225-237 Front Matter....Pages 239-239 Advantages and Limits of Formal Approaches for Ultra-High Dependability....Pages 241-251 Software Statistical Testing....Pages 253-272 An Experimental Evaluation of Formal Testing and Statistical Testing....Pages 273-281 Testing Distributed Real-Time Systems: An Overview....Pages 283-297 Back Matter....Pages 299-305 Front Matter....Pages 307-308 Integration and Comparison of Three Physical Fault Injection Techniques....Pages 309-327 Fault Injection into VHDL Models: The MEFISTO Tool....Pages 329-346 Estimators for Fault Tolerance Coverage Evaluation....Pages 347-366 Back Matter....Pages 367-370 Front Matter....Pages 371-372 Software Reliability Trend Analyses: From Theoretical to Practical Considerations....Pages 373-388 The Transformation Approach to the Modelling and Evaluation of Reliability and Availability Growth....Pages 389-406 New Ways to Get Accurate Reliability Measures....Pages 407-419 Combination of Predictions Obtained from Different Software Reliability Growth Models....Pages 421-439 Dependability Modelling and Evaluation of Software Fault-Tolerant Systems....Pages 441-457 Dependability Analysis of Iterative Fault-Tolerant Software Considering Correlation....Pages 459-472 Validation of Ultra-High Dependability for Software-based Systems....Pages 473-493 Back Matter....Pages 495-503 Front Matter....Pages 505-506 Computable Dependability Bounds for Large Markov Chains....Pages 507-518 Fast Numerical Solution for a Class of Markov Models....Pages 519-532 Back Matter....Pages 533-534 Front Matter....Pages 535-535 Towards Operational Measures of Computer Security: Concepts....Pages 537-553 Towards Operational Measures of Computer Security: Experimentation and Modelling....Pages 555-569 Back Matter....Pages 571-572 Back Matter....Pages 573-589