A survey of software aging and rejuvenation studies

Abstract

Software aging is a phenomenon plaguing many long-running complex software systems, which exhibit performance degradation or an increasing failure rate. Several strategies based on the proactive rejuvenation of the software state have been proposed to counteract software aging and prevent failures. This survey article provides an overview of studies on Software Aging and Rejuvenation (SAR) that have appeared in major journals and conference proceedings, with respect to the statistical approaches that have been used to forecast software aging phenomena and to plan rejuvenation, the kind of systems and aging effects that have been studied, and the techniques that have been proposed to rejuvenate complex software systems. The analysis is useful to identify key results from SAR research, and it is leveraged in this article to highlight trends and open issues.

A Simple Software Rejuvenation Framework Based on Model Driven Development

“…However, software rejuvenation increases system downtime as the system is taken out of operation while the rejuvenation process is performed. Knowing when to perform rejuvenation process on a system is a crucial factor recognized by researchers to minimize cost and maximize availability [3]. The framework we have proposed addresses this issue by working on the system on design level without terminating the system operation while the rejuvenation solution is finalized.…”

“…Several measureable techniques have been proposed to detect software aging such as "aging indicators" and "time series analysis." The techniques are used to collect data about resources used in a system, and then, analyze it to see if the consumption rate has increased over time which is a sign of aging [3]. As for the causes of software aging, there are two major classes, the first is known as "ignorant surgery" and the second is known as "lack of movement."…”

“…The objective of software rejuvenation is to rollback a system continuously to maintain the normal operation of the system and prevent failures. According to Cotroneo et al [3] application-specific and application-generic are two main classes of software rejuvenation techniques in which the former works on specific system features and the latter works on the whole system (e.g., system restart).…”

“…To further elaborate on the two main classes, researchers have provided a number of examples for both; flushing of kernel, file system defragmentation and resource reprioritization are examples of application specific rejuvenation and application restart, cluster failover, and operating system reboot are examples of application generic rejuvenation [3]. Fig.…”

“…As demands for functionality grow software complexity rises, and as a result software, underperformance and malfunctioning became apparent [2]. Software aging is a known phenomenon with recognized symptoms such as increase in failure rate [3]. Researchers have identified a number of causes of software aging, for example, accumulation of errors over time during system operation.…”