Exploring the role of sequential computation in distributed systems: motivating a programming paradigm shift

Abstract

Despite many advances in programming models and frameworks, writing distributed applications remains hard. Even when the underlying logic is inherently sequential and simple, addressing distributed aspects results in complex cross-cutting code that undermines such simplicity.

This paper analyzes different programming models to motivate a new paradigm that leverages the sequential computation model, while gaining the expressiveness for distribution. The paper argues for an adoption of the paradigm shift by exhibiting a programming model that allows easier reasoning about the conceptual aspects of distributed systems' behavior. The newly proposed programming model provides a clean separation of concerns and retains the simplicity of sequential computation, using it as a basis onto which distributed aspects are added without corrupting the essential sequential structure, while offloading much of the complexity of implementing distributed concerns to the compiler. We demonstrate the feasibility of this model on a case study, identifying key improvements over existing approaches.