Reliable broadcast for fault-tolerance on local computer networks

The authors discuss the definition and design of a generic reliable communication architecture on a widely used host-independent platform, such as a local area network (LAN). Two relevant aspects are the use of nonreplicated LANs and self-checking components. The protocol is innovative, in the sense that, although clockless and running on a nonreplicated network, it displays bounded execution times. Thus the architecture is capable of reliably addressing realtime. Support of high-performance real-time applications with this architecture is being seriously considered in the present phase of project Delta-4, a CEC Esprit II consortium designing an open, dependable distributed architecture. The authors' considerations regarding synchronism properties of clockless protocols are being applied in this context.