Blog: European Computer Scientists Seek New Framework for Computation

European Computer Scientists Seek New Framework for Computation
European Science Foundation (10/29/08)

One of the challenges still remaining for electronic computation is the ability to break down large complex processes into small, more manageable components that can be reused in different applications. This goal can be accomplished in a variety of ways, but none of them can manage all the processes very well. The major problem is that the dependent links, or correlations, that interconnect computer processes or programs cannot be broken down. These dependent links are common to all processes in which computation is involved, including biological systems, quantum computing, and conventional programming. European computer scientists believe that now is the time to create a coordinated effort to solve the correlation problem, and the European Science Foundation recently held a workshop to establish a framework for additional research. The workshop identified that correlations in computer science represent an important problem common to the entire field of programming and concluded that the evolution of general purpose computing has reached a point where the correlation problem will hinder additional progress. The workshop discussed progress in the relatively new field of aspect-oriented software development (AOSD), which is creating new techniques for isolating the correlations bridging software components. AOSD techniques make it possible to modularize those aspects of a system or process that cut across different components, enabling them to be broken down into reusable components or objects.

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