Current middleware solutions, e.g., application servers and Web
services, are very complex software products that are hard to tame
because of intricacies of distributed systems. Their functionalities
have mostly been developed and managed with the help of administration
tools and corresponding configuration files, recently in XML. Though
this constitutes flexibility for developing and administrating a
distributed application, the conceptual model underlying the different
configurations is only implicit.
To remedy such problems, Semantic Management of Middleware
contributes an ontology-based approach to support the development and
administration of middleware-based applications. The ontology is an
explicit conceptual model with formal logic-based semantics. Its
descriptions may therefore be queried, may foresight required actions,
or may be checked to avoid inconsistent system configurations.
This book builds a rigorous approach towards giving the declarative
descriptions of components and services a well-defined meaning by
specifying ontological foundations and by showing how such foundations
may be realized in practical, up-and-running systems.