A graph-based automatic services composition based on cost estimation heuristic

Abstract

Currently, both software and hardware are being virtualised and offered as services on the internet. Companies have an opportunity to improve their workflows by composing services that best suit their quality and cost requirements. However, as more services become available, computer-aided services discovery and composition become essential. Traditional service representation and planning algorithms do not adequately address non-functional characteristics, large numbers of similar operators (i.e., services), and limited numbers of objects (i.e., inputs and outputs per service). This paper analyses existing work in automatic services composition, service representation and planning algorithms and proposes a new framework to address those needs. It proves that the proposed framework provides an admissible heuristic based on cost estimations that guarantee a minimum cost solution, if one exists.