Availability Analysis of Software Systems with Rejuvenation and Checkpointing

Abstract

In software reliability engineering, software-rejuvenation and -checkpointing techniques are widely used for enhancing system reliability and strengthening data protection. In this paper, a stochastic framework composed of a composite stochastic Petri reward net and its resulting non-Markovian availability model is presented to capture the dynamic behavior of an operational software system in which time-based software rejuvenation and checkpointing are both aperiodically conducted. In particular, apart from the software-aging problem that may cause the system to fail, human-error factors (i.e., a system operator’s misoperations) during checkpointing are also considered. To solve the stationary solution of the non-Markovian availability model, which is derived on the basis of the reachability graph of stochastic Petri reward nets and is actually not one of the trivial stochastic models such as the semi-Markov process and the Markov regenerative process, the phase-expansion approach is considered. In numerical experiments, we illustrate steady-state system availability and find optimal software-rejuvenation policies that maximize steady-state system availability. The effects of human-error factors on both steady-state system availability and the optimal software-rejuvenation trigger timing are also evaluated. Numerical results showed that human errors during checkpointing both decreased system availability and brought a significant effect on the optimal rejuvenation-trigger timing, so that it should not be overlooked during system modeling.

Availability optimization of biological and chemical processing unit using genetic algorithm and particle swarm optimization

“…sewage treatment plant in plain areas based on reliability analysis. Zheng et al (2021) carried out an availability analysis using the ideas of rejuvenation and checkpointing in automated systems. Ruiz-Castro (2021) optimizes the reliability of a multi-state cold standby system.…”

“…Haghighi and Bakhshipour (2016) proposed a design for the sewage treatment plant in plain areas based on reliability analysis. Zheng et al. (2021) carried out an availability analysis using the ideas of rejuvenation and checkpointing in automated systems.…”

Optimal Corrective Maintenance Policies via an Availability-Cost Hybrid Factor for Software Aging Systems

“…Koutras and Platis [15] developed multi-objective optimization problems to derive the rejuvenation policies for optimizing the system overall performance capability, taking into account availability and operating cost constraints. Zheng et al [16] proposed a stochastic framework composed of a composite stochastic Petri reward net and its resulting non-Markovian availability model to capture the dynamic behavior of an operational software system in which time-based software rejuvenation and checkpointing are both aperiodically conducted. Baghi and Navimipour [17] utilized a hybrid cuckoo search (CS) and genetic algorithm (GA) to optimize the scheduling of cloud database paths, aiming to enhance the availability and reduce the cost of cloud computing.…”

Dynamic Analysis of Software Systems with Aperiodic Impulse Rejuvenation

“…Koutras and Platis [11] proposed a multi-objective optimization strategy to optimize a system's overall performance capability. Zheng et al [12] presented a composite stochastic Petri reward network and its resulting non-Markovian availability model for operational software systems.…”