Defining autonomic computing: a software engineering perspective

As a rapidly growing field, autonomic computing is a promising new approach for developing large scale distributed systems. However, while the vision of achieving self-management in computing systems is well established, the field still lacks a commonly accepted definition of ´what´ an autonomic computing system is. Without a common definition to dictate the direction of development, it is not possible to know whether a system or technology is a part of autonomic computing, or if in fact an autonomic computing system has already been built. The purpose of this paper is to establish a standardised and quantitative definition of autonomic computing through the application of the quality metrics framework described in IEEE Std 1061-1998. Through the application of this methodology, stakeholders were systematically analysed and evaluated to obtain a balanced and structured definition of autonomic computing. This definition allows for further development and implementation of quality metrics, which are project-specific, quantitative measurements that can be used to validate the success of future autonomic computing projects.