ECOOP / Workshop 01

Exception Handling in Object Oriented Systems: towards Emerging Application Areas and New Programming Paradigms

Abstract

Modern object oriented systems have to cope with an increasing number of exceptional situations. The most general way of dealing with these problems is by employing exception handling mechanisms. In the past many such mechanisms have been proposed. In spite of this there are still many problems in applying them because:

the mechanisms themselves and the methodologies of using them are often error-prone
specification, verification and testing of systems with exceptions is complicated
there are many emerging areas requiring novel mechanisms.

We are going to discuss some important topics of designing and using exception handling techniques in object oriented systems and languages intended for modern applications such as ambient intelligence, pervasive/ubiquitous computing, collaborative systems, e-science, the Internet, adaptive and self-repairing systems, multi-organisational systems, computer-based systems, multiple agent systems, etc. The workshop will provide a forum for discussing research on all areas of exception handling related to object oriented systems, in particular formalisation, distributed and concurrent systems, mobile systems, new paradigms, design patterns and frameworks, component-based technologies, practical languages and open architectures.

We intend to discuss the problem of perceived complexity of using and understanding exception handling: why do programmers and practitioners often believe that it complicates system design and analysis? What should be done to improve the situation? Why is exception handling the last mechanism to learn and to use? What is wrong with the current practice and teaching?

We expect the workshop to improve our understanding of exception handling, summarise the current state of art in the area, outline promising directions of current and long-term research, and help build a closer cooperation between participants.

Main Topics

exception handling
system structuring
fault tolerance
software engineering
programming languages
component-based systems

We plan to have 4 sessions chaired by the organisers. Three of these sessions (focusing on different topical areas) will be dedicated to brief presentations of the selected papers followed by focused discussions. The last session will be devoted to extended general discussions shepherded by the organisers (the issues for discussions and the questions to address will be prepared in advance). It will focus on the most important topics related to the submissions received and relate the overall workshop results with the results of the previous workshop (held at ECOOP 2000).

Paper Submission


Type of Papers	position / vision / experience / research
Formatting Size	LNCS, Springer no more than 7 pages
Deadlines	Submission May 10^th Notification May 17^th

Details


Organizers	Alexander Romanovsky, University of Newcastle upon Tyne, UK Christophe Dony, Université Montpellier-II, France Jørgen Lindskov Knudsen, Mjølner Informatics A/S, Denmark Anand Tripathi, University of Minnesota, USA
Date Location	Monday, July 21^st
Workshop Home Page	http://www.cs.ncl.ac.uk/~alexander.romanovsky/home.formal/ehoos2003.html
Number of participants	14-25
Rules for Attending	paper presenters preferred, "observers" only when there is space left
Contact Person	Alexander Romanovsky