A Trace Semantics for Long-Running Transactions

Abstract. A long-running transaction is an interactive component of a distributed system which must be executed as if it were a single atomic action. In principle, it should not be interrupted or fail in the middle, and it must not be interleaved with other atomic actions of other concurrently executing components of the system. In practice, the illusion of atomicity for a long-running transaction is achieved with the aid of compensation actions supplied by the original programmer: because the transaction is interactive, familiar automatic techniques of check-pointing and rollback are no longer adequate. This paper constructs a model of long-running transactions within the framework of the CSP process algebra, showing how the compensations are orchestrated to achieve the illusion of atomicity. It introduces a method for declaring that a process is a transaction, and for declaring a compensation for it in case it needs to be rolled back after it has committed. The familiar operator of s...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2004
• Where: BIRTHDAY
• Authors: Michael J. Butler, C. A. R. Hoare, Carla Ferreira
• Keywords: Applied Computing, Atomic Actions, BIRTHDAY 2004, Long-running Transactions, Single Atomic Action