Object-oriented reliable distributed programming

The importance of reliability in large distributed systems can not be underestimated. Considerable effort has been directed towards the development of software reuse. However, the methods and models evolved are often complex, and the tools developed from these ideas reflect this complexity. Consequently, software structuring methods that can reduce or control complexity are important. The authors explore an object-oriented approach to address some programming methodology issues in reliable distributed computing. They begin by classifying group-related communication in an inheritance-based hierarchy. Next, they explore the use of object groups as a new programming paradigm, and present an implementation of an object-group programming toolkit based on these ideas