Unreliable Failure Detectors via Operational Semantics

Abstract. The concept of unreliable failure detectors for reliable distributed systems was introduced by Chandra and Toueg as a fine-grained means to add weak forms of synchrony into asynchronous systems. Various kinds of such failure detectors have been identified as each being the weakest to solve some specific distributed programming problem. In this paper, we provide a fresh look at failure detectors from the point of view of programming languages, more precisely using the formal tool of operational semantics. Inspired by this, we propose a new failure detector model that we consider easier to understand, easier to work with and more natural. Using operational semantics, we prove formally that representations of failure detectors in the new model are equivalent to their original representations within the model used by Chandra and Toueg. 1 Executive Summary Background In the field of Distributed Algorithms, a widely-used computation model is based on asynchronous communication ...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2003
• Where: ASIAN
• Authors: Uwe Nestmann, Rachele Fuzzati
• Keywords: ASIAN 2003, Failure Detectors, Operational Semantics, Unreliable Failure Detectors