LoST: Local State Transfer -- An Architectural Style for the Distributed Enactment of Business Protocols

Abstract

Local State Transfer (LoST) is a simple, declarative approach for enacting communication protocols. LoST is perfectly distributed and relies only upon the local knowledge of each business partner. It involves a novel treatment of the information bases of protocols, especially in terms of how their parameters are specified. As a result, LoST can capture subtle patterns of interaction that more complex approaches cannot handle well. Further, LoST lends itself to implementations that are robust against unordered and lossy message transmission.