Netlog, a Rule-Based Language for Distributed Programming

Abstract

Abstract. We propose a rule-based language, Netlog, to express distributed applications such as communication protocols or P2P applications in a declarative manner. The language extends Datalog with communication primitives, as well as aggregation and non-deterministic constructs, standard in network applications. Our contribution is twofold. First we define a sound distributed fixpoint semantics, which takes explicitly into account the in-node behavior as well as the communication between nodes, and solves semantic problems raised in declarative networking. Second, we show that syntactic restrictions over the programs can ensure polynomial bounds on the complexity (time and message) of the distributed execution. The language has been implemented and runs over a virtual machine, Netquest, which relies on a DBMS. Netlog programs are partly compiled into SQL queries, which makes them portable over heterogeneous architecture.

A Framework for Verifying Data-Centric Protocols

“…Only the main constructs of the language are presented. A more thorough presentation can be found in [13]. Netlog relies on Datalog-like recursive rules, of the form head ← body, which allow to derive the fact "head" whenever the "body" is satisfied.…”

“…We show that it is indeed feasible to reason about the distributed behaviour of individual nodes which together yield some expected global behaviour of the whole network. We consider the Netlog language [13], which relies on deductive rules of the form head ← body, which are installed on each node of the distributed system. The rules allow to derive new facts of the form "head", if their body is satisfied locally on the node.…”

Survey on Data-Centric based Routing Protocols for Wireless Sensor Networks

“…Here the receiving node sends the packet to a neighbor that is randomly selected. This neighbor selects another neighbor, which picks another random neighbor to forward the packet to, and the process continues as such (Grumbach, and Wang, 2010).…”

Applying Prolog to develop distributed systems

“…Both languages have been successfully used for the implementation of important networked systems and protocols, and serve as a research platform for the development of specialized variants -see http: //declarativity.net for further pointers -as well as verification tools Yabandeh et al 2010;Navarro and Rybalchenko 2009;Wang et al 2009;Pérez et al 2009). Alternative approaches that attempt to extend Datalog for use in a distributed environment, while trying to overcome the pitfalls of early Declarative Networking implementations, are Meld (Ashley-Rollman et al 2007;Ashley-Rollman et al 2009), WIND (Mao 2010) and Netlog (Grumbach and Wang 2010). A common feature of these projects is that they all argue that a 'pure' Datalog based language is not appropriate for the development of stateful applications.…”