Runtime Systems for Large-Scale Software Services

运行时系统是为与近期和中期未来的经济增长相关的现代IT服务（如大数据、金融、web服务或高性能计算）提供动力的引擎。特别是在云计算上下文中，运行时系统通常是分层的，这暴露了性能和健壮性的缺陷。本课题主要研究运行时系统软件设计的简洁性和高效性。简单意味着健壮性（这与安全性有关），而资源效率是高性能和绿色计算的先决条件。本研究计划的总体目标是增加大规模软件服务的健壮性、效率和性能。这些目标解决了仍然与大规模计算相关的关键挑战。提出的研究旨在调查现有的运行时系统，并为下一代运行时系统的软件设计提出新的方法。******使用的方法包括开发作为开源项目发布的软件原型，以及对替代软件设计进行系统的实验评估。除了评估本拨款申请中讨论的新颖建议外，该研究计划还将改进软件设计的规范知识，因为它与可扩展性能有关。实际上，通过开源软件产生的大量成果可以直接孵化学术研究和教学，以及工业发展项目。******本研究所寻求的许多改进对最终用户来说只是间接可见的。系统将运行得更快，服务运行得更顺畅，并有望减少故障。同时，服务的实现和提供在专用硬件上的投资更少，从而减少了资本支出，并以更少的能源投入运行。从商业角度（减少运营费用）来看，这一点很重要，但从一般社会角度来看，这一点也很重要。数据中心消耗大量的电力，效率的提高可能会导致能源消耗的减少，同时对环境也有相应的好处。******拟议的研究将通过培训HQP、传播软件工件和促进当地可用于知识转移的专门知识，使加拿大IT行业以及任何使用大规模软件服务的行业受益。此外，大规模计算服务减少能源消耗所带来的环境效益将对整个社会有益

Runtime systems are the engines that power modern IT services associated with economic growth in the near- and medium-term future, such as big data, finance, web services, or high-performance computing. Especially in the context of cloud computing, runtime systems are often layered, which exposes performance and robustness deficiencies. This research program is concerned with studying the software design of runtime systems in terms of simplicity and efficiency. Simplicity implies robustness (which is related to security), while resource-efficiency is a precondition for high performance and green computing. The general objectives of this research program are increasing the robustness, efficiency, and performance of large-scale software services. These objectives address key challenges still associated with large-scale computing. The proposed research seeks to investigate existing runtime systems and to propose novel approaches for the software design of next generation runtime systems.******The methodology being used includes developing software prototypes that are being published as open-source projects and the systematic experimental evaluation of alternative software designs. In addition to evaluating the novel proposals discussed in this grant application, the research program will also improve the canonical knowledge of software design as it pertains to scalable performance. In practical terms, the proliferation of results through open source software can directly incubate academic research and teaching, as well as industrial development projects.******Many of the improvements sought with this research will be only indirectly visible to end users. Systems will run faster, services operate smoother, and hopefully fail less. At the same time, services can be implemented and provided with fewer investments in special-purpose hardware, thus less capital expenses, and operated with less energy input. This aspect is important from a business point of view (reduced operating expenses), but also from a general societal point of view. Data centres consume significant amounts of electricity and an increase in efficiency will likely lead to a decrease in energy consumption, along with the corresponding benefits for the environment.******The proposed research will benefit the Canadian IT industry, as well as any industry using large-scale software services, by training HQP, disseminating software artifacts, and contributing to the expertise that is locally available for knowledge transfer. Furthermore, the environmental benefits from reduced energy consumption for large-scale computing services will be beneficial to society in general.**