Global Events PhD Plan, by Adam Rifkin

Adam Rifkin, http://www.ifindkarma.com/attic/phd/

My PhD thesis will be the semantic definition of an event model. In this model, events are simply messages (e.g., typed data) with accompanying local timestamps that can

1. be forwarded without modification (event forwarding),
2. be merged into events containing all the information from their "component" events (event aggregation), or
3. be merged into events containing some of the information from their "component" events by performing a well-defined "filter" (event filtering).

The semantic definition includes the precise specification of what is meant by subscribing and unsubscribing to an event stream, what is meant by notification services, and so forth.

I expect my thesis to have three components.

1. A survey of existing event notification architectures. See the start of my bibliography.
2. The precise semantic definition of an event system -- the event system described above -- using Actors or temporal logic.
3. The implementation of an event-related application of this system, such as an auction, or some sort of soft real-time control system, or a collaborative environment (multiple people working on documents or animation or games). This will involve writing the application and/or simulating it, with an analysis of the performance results. The application should be small, useful, and annotatable to serve as a testbed for the event model.

Related Documents

1. An Events Bibliography. May 1998. (html)
2. Thoughts on a Generic Event API. April 1998. (html)
3. Global Event Algorithm Experiments. March 1998. (html)
4. Global Events: Request-for-Proposals Example. March 1998. (html)
5. Why Events? March 1998. (html)
6. Using Announce-Listen with Global Events to Develop Distributed Control Systems. Written with Mani Chandy and Eve Schooler, February 1998. Java '98, ACM 1998 Workshop on Java for High-Performance Network Computing. (html / PostScript / slides in PostScript)
7. PhD Thesis Research Proposal Summary. January 1998. (html / PostScript)
8. Using a Global Event Model in Distributed Control Systems. Draft, December 1997. (html / PostScript)
9. A General Resource Reservation Framework for Scientific Computing. Written with Mani Chandy, Ravi Ramamoorthi, Boris Dimitrov, December 1997. First International Scientific Computing in Object-Oriented Parallel Environments (ISCOPE) Conference. (html / PostScript)
10. Systematic Composition of Objects in Distributed Internet Applications: Processes and Sessions. Written with Mani Chandy. Oxford University Press Computer Journal, October 1997. (html / PostScript)
11. Global Event Model Ideas. Draft as slides, for group meeting, October 1997. (PostScript / LaTeX)

Last modified: Sun Jan 2 06:20:23 PDT 2000