Invited Paper: Middleware for Next Generation Distributed Systems: Main Challenges and Perspectives

In the recent past, the scope of distributed systems has drastically changed. Advances in device miniaturization and wireless networking have made distributed systems components evolve from workstations and servers linked by wired networks, to Internet of things linked by a variety of networks. Middleware technology designed for legacy distributed systems is no longer suitable to these new kinds of distributed systems. In this paper we describe the main challenges raised by this evolution, with stress put on ad hoc, spontaneous and sensor systems. A survey of the current state of the art will be given, together with major pending issues and perspectives in the domain