Abstract

In recent years, an increasing demand for highly automated, process-oriented, and distributed systems consisting of a large number of interconnected heterogeneous hardware and software components is noticeable. These systems—usually composed of components from different manufacturers—require a high interoperability across heterogeneous physical media, platforms, programming languages, and application domains facing several problems:

Proprietary interfaces. Components have mostly proprietary interfaces weakening compatibility, and developers must know them in order to use such components.

Limitations in the awareness. Component users are often not aware of other component’s functionality.

Limited discovery capabilities. Component users do not know how to search for a component with certain functionality nor do they know which components are available in a certain scope.

Proprietary methods for interactions. The interaction mechanisms between components are mostly bound to their application and application domain. The formats for exchanging message as well as the used data formats are mostly proprietary.

Constrained composition capabilities. Processes/workflows describing the interaction between components are designed for specific applications and domains and seldom applicable for other components and applications.