April 18, 2017
Today, IFIP Working Group 10.4 announced that two outstanding papers have been selected as winners of the 2017 Jean-Claude Laprie Award in Dependable Computing:
For technical/scientific research impact:
Kuang-Hua Huang and Jacob A. Abraham, “Algorithm Based Fault Tolerance for Matrix Operations”, in IEEE Transactions on Computers, Vol. C-33, No. 6, pp. 518-528, June 1984
Kuang-Hua Huang and Jacob A. Abraham‘s Algorithm Based Fault Tolerance for Matrix Operations has formed the basis for an entire new domain of research within the umbrella of dependable computing over the last 30 years. Huang and Abraham’s paper was the first proposing an effective mathematical technique for algorithm level fault tolerance in matrix operations, showing that data could be encoded with very low overhead and provide effective error detection and correction. Since matrices are in the heart of many computation-intensive operations, this technique has been widely used and has inspired significant research work on algorithm based fault tolerance in other computing domains and applications. This outstanding paper has not only stood the test of time, keeping an extensive impact on dependable computing research and practice, but it has also seen its relevance increased year after year, as can be attested by the growing number of its citations.
Richard Schlichting and Fred Schneider “Fail-Stop Processors: An Approach to Designing Fault-Tolerant Computing Systems” in ACM Transactions on Computing Systems, 1(3), Aug. 1983, pp. 222-238.
Schlichting and Schneider’s outstanding paper proposed the fail-stop abstract failure model and defined a formal approach to building fault-tolerant software using this abstraction. The clean failure semantics of the fail-stop model facilitates the building of fault-tolerant software in a distributed system by raising the level of abstraction and greatly simplifying the failure behavior assumption the system designer has to address, moving away from arbitrary failure models and focusing on the simple detection of the cessation of activity by the processor. The paper has significantly influenced subsequent research work that has developed fail-stop model utilizations or proposed model approximations, originating variants of the silent failure behavior such as the fail-fast and fail-safe
Authors of the winning paper will be presented the award on June 27 2017 in Denver, USA, during the opening session of the Annual IEEE/IFIP International Conference on Dependable Systems and Networks
About the Jean-Claude Laprie Award in Dependable Computing
The award was created in 2011, in honor of Jean-Claude Laprie (1944-2010), whose pioneering contributions to the concepts and methodologies of dependability were influential in defining and unifying the field of dependable and secure computing. The award recognizes outstanding papers that have significantly influenced the theory and/or practice of Dependable Computing.
For more information on the Jean-Claude Laprie Award please visit
http://jclaprie-award.dependability.org
About IFIP WG 10.4 on Dependable Computing and Fault Tolerance
IFIP Working Group 10.4 was established in 1980 with the aim of identifying and integrating approaches, methods and techniques for specifying, designing, building, assessing, validating, operating and maintaining dependable computer systems, that is those that are reliable, available, safe, and secure. Its 75 members from around the world meet twice a year to to conduct in-depth discussions of important technical topics to further the understanding and exposition of the fundamental concepts of dependable computing.
For more information on IFIP WG10.4 visit http://wg10.4.dependability.org
About the International Federation For Information Processing
IFIP is a non-governmental, non-profit umbrella organization for national societies working in the field of information processing. It was established in 1960 under the auspices of UNESCO as a result of the first World Computer Congress held in Paris in 1959. It is the leading multinational, apolitical organization in Information & Communications Technologies and Sciences.
For more information on IFIP visit http://www.ifip.org
Media Contact:
Charles B. Weinstock
412-298-9747
weinstock@dependability.org