Chapter 2 - Architectures

Introduction

 How to organize the collection of software components

 We will discuss
 Logical organization and physical organization
 i.e., software or system architectures: how they are
organized and how they communicate
 Architectural styles
 System architectures: centralized (client-server) vs
decentralized ones (where machines play equal roles)

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2.1 Architectural Styles
 Refers to the logical organization of distributed systems into
software components
 A component is a modular unit with well-defined, required and
provided interfaces that is replaceable within its environment;
can be replaced provided that we respect its interfaces
 A connector is a mechanism that mediates communication,
coordination, or cooperation among components, e.g., facilities
for RPC, message passing, or streaming multimedia data
 There are various architectural styles
 Layered architectures
 Object-based architectures
 Data-centered architectures
 Event-based architectures

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 Layered Architectures
 Components are organized in a layered fashion where a
component at layer Li is allowed to call components at the
underlying layer Li-1, but not the other way around;
 Requests go down the hierarchy and results flow upward
 e.g., network layers

The layered architectural style 4

 Object-based Architectures
 Each object corresponds to a component and these components are
connected through a remote procedure call mechanism (matches the
client-server paradigm)

The object-based architectural style

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 Data-centered Architectures
 Processes communicate through a common repository; e.g., a
shared distributed file system
 Event-based architectures
 Processes communicate through the propagation of events
(can also optionally carry data)
 Publish/subscribe systems
 Processes publish events and the middleware ensures that only
those processes that subscribed to those events will receive
them
 Processes are loosely
coupled; no need of
explicitly referring to
each other

The event-based architectural style 6

 Shared Data Spaces
 Event-based architectures combined with data-centered
architectures
 Processes are decoupled in time

The shared data-space architectural style

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2.2 System Architectures
 Refers to the physical organization of distributed systems into
software components or how are processes organized in a
system; where do we place software components
 Deciding on software components, their interaction, and their
placement is what system architecture is all about
 Can be centralized, decentralized or a hybrid

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2.2.1 Centralized Architectures
 Thinking in terms of clients requesting services from servers
 A server is a process implementing a specific service
 A client is a process that requests a service from a server by
sending a request and waiting for a reply
 We have a request-reply behaviour

General interaction between a client and a server

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 Communication between client and server can be
 By a connectionless protocol if the underlying network is fairly
reliable; efficient since there is no much overhead
 But assuring reliability is difficult
 We don’t also know the source of error; was the request or the
reply lost, for instance
 When messages are lost or corrupted let the client send the
request again; applicable only for idempotent operations
 An operation is idempotent if it can be repeated multiple
times without harm; e.g., reading a record in a database
 But, transferring an amount to a bank account is not
idempotent
 See later in Chapter 8 - Fault Tolerance
 By a reliable connection-oriented protocol if the underlying
network is unreliable
 Establishing and terminating connections is expensive 10
 Application Layering
 There are many controversies about the client-server model
 e.g., no clear distinction between a client and a server; for
instance a server for a distributed database may act as a
client when it forwards requests to different file servers
 Three levels of distribution (following the layered
architecture)
 The user-interface level: implemented by clients and
contains all that is required by a client; varying from a
character-based screen to more advanced GUI-based
interfaces (more on user interfaces in Chapter 3)
 The processing level: contains the applications
 The data level: contains the programs that maintain the
actual data dealt with

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 e.g., the general organization of an Internet search engine into three different
layers

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 Client-Server Architectures
 How to physically distribute a client-server application across
several machines
 Multitiered Architectures

Two-tiered architecture: alternative client-server organizations

(a) Put only terminal-dependent part of the user interface on the client
machine and let the applications remotely control the presentation
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(b) Put the entire user-interface software on the client side
(c) Move part of the application to the client, e.g. checking
correctness in filling forms
 (a) To (c) are for thin clients
(d) and (e) are for powerful client machines what are called fat clients
(more popular)
(d) and (e) are difficult to manage since client-side software is
distributed and is prone to error; it is also dependent on the
client’s platform such as operating system

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 A server may sometimes act as a client leading to a physically
three-tiered architecture; an example is the organization of Web
sites

Three tiered architecture: an example of a server acting as a client

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2.2.2 Decentralized Architectures
 Vertical distribution
 Refers to the ones discussed so far where the different tiers
correspond directly with the logical organization of
applications
 Place logically different components on different machines
 Horizontal distribution
 Physically split up the client or the server into logically
equivalent parts
 An example is a peer-to-peer system where processes are
equal and hence each process acts as a client and a server
at the same time (servent)
 Read about the different approaches of peer-to-peer
architecture - pages 44 - 51 and about Architectures versus
Middleware - pages 54 - 66

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 Another example is the horizontal distribution of a Web service

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