Highly Dependable Ip-based Networks and Services (HIDENETS)

HIDENETS - a Specific Targeted Research Project (STREP) in the European 6th Framework Program running in the period from January 2006 to March 2009. It developed and analyzed end-to-end resilience solutions for distributed applications and mobility-aware services in car-to-car communication scenarios with infrastructure service support.

Thereby, the concept of resilience extends the classical notion of fault tolerance, usually applied to recover system functions in spite of operational faults, to some level of adaptability, so as to be able to cope with system evolution and unanticipated conditions. Main results of HIDENETS are: (1) Design and evaluation of a run-time resilience support via a set of middleware and communication level functions; (2) A holistic evaluation framework for quantitative analysis of dependability properties of HIDENETS-like applications in highly mobile settings; (3) Design methodologies and tool support for the development and testing of resilient applications on top of the HIDENETS middleware; (4) Prototype implementation and evaluation acting as proof-of-concept of key aspects of the HIDENETS solutions; (5) Dissemination material including a detailed tutorial of over 900 slides. The HIDENETS solutions contribute to a user perception of trustworthiness of future wireless services, as this perception is strongly impacted by availability and resilience aspects. Such perception is critical for the technical and business success of these services.
The solution development and analysis required a holistic approach combining aspects of communications, middleware, service deployment and access. Hence the research work combined forces from the engineering community and from leading research teams on resilient distributed systems.

EU Specific Targeted Research Projects (IST-FP6-STREP-26979)

Period:

2006 - 2008

Partners:

• TWENTE INSTITUTE FOR WIRELESS AND MOBILE COMMUNICATIONS BV (Netherlands)
• FUNDACAO DA FACULDADE DE CIENCIAS DA UNIVERSIDADE DE LISBOA (Portugal)
• FUJITSU SIEMENS COMPUTERS GMBH (Germany)
• CARMEQ GMBH (Germany)
• TELENOR ASA (Norway)
• BUDAPESTI MUSZAKI ES GAZDASAGTUDOMANYI EGYETEM (Hungary)
• CENTRE NATIONAL DE LA RECHERCHE SCIENTIFIQUE (France)
• UNIVERSITA DEGLI STUDI DI FIRENZE (Italy)

Project aim:

The aim of HIDENETS is to develop and analyse end-to-end resilience solutions for distributed applications and mobility-aware services in ubiquitous communication scenarios.

Technical solutions will be developed for applications with critical dependability requirements in the context of selected use-cases of ad-hoc car-to-car communication with infrastructure service support. The HIDENETS solutions are essential for the deployment of future business-critical applications: the use of off-the-shelf components and wireless communication links will dramatically decrease the costs of market entry and hence make such ubiquitous scenarios commercially feasible. However, these components and communication links are inherently unreliable, and therefore end-to-end system-level resilience solutions addressing both accidental and malicious faults must be developed. Analysis and validation of these solutions will be performed via analytic/simulation models, and via an experimental proof-of-concept prototype. The HIDENETS solutions are expected to contribute to a user perception of trustworthiness of future wireless services, as this perception is strongly impacted by availability and resilience aspects. Such perception is critical for the technical and business success of these services.

The solution development and analysis require a holistic approach combining aspects of communications, middleware, service deployment and access. Hence the research work combines forces from the engineering community and from leading research teams on resilient distributed systems: Universities of Aalborg (DK), Budapest (HU), Lisbon (PT), Florence (IT), LAAS-CNRS (FR), Twente Institute WMC (NL), Carmeq (GER), Fujitsu Siemens Computers (GER), Telenor (NO).

The final result will show how resilience solutions for new mobility-aware distributed applications with critical dependability requirements can be designed, implemented, and evaluated on open communication infrastructures.

Further information: András Pataricza, Ph.D.