T. Putnam and K. Liu (UK)
Software Market, Web Services, Software Exchange, Commoditisation, Grid Computing, Autonomic Computing
Autonomic Computing highlights self-adaptability as a key feature of a software agent, implying the use of resources from its environment in dynamic redefinition of its implementation. Service-oriented systems in both the Web and Grid communities also purport dynamic composition of software functionality. Meanwhile, software reuse aims to reduce the cost of computing through abstraction, or existing source and component retrieval and integration. Underlying these fields are the issues of matching and selection from a range of alternative resources in a dynamic, heterogeneous environment. Electronic exchanges for all kinds of commodities are in the ascendancy. Similarly, much current research discusses the commoditisation of software services, yet, the issue of exchange of ownership of software in all its forms remains neglected, yet clearly a key part in the aforementioned fields, and an underestimated barrier to effective reuse in any form. In this paper we identify limitations in modelling software at a service level as a market commodity, and introduce a more complete model of software as a product suitable for the dynamic exchange of software functionality between heterogeneous systems both for use, and future system composition.
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