Large-Scale Software Development: An Object-Oriented ADAPTIVE Communication Environment (ACE) for High Performance Communication 

We and our collaborators have designed and implemented the ADAPTIVE Communication Environment (ACE) framework for efficiently supporting communication systems and facilitating multimedia application development [1]. ACE was developed over a decade ago; however, it remains today as vastly popular software that has been adopted by a large number of companies. .

A communication system consists of protocol functions (such as connection management, end-to-end flow control, remote context management, segmentation/reassembly, demultiplexing, message buffering, error protection, session control, and presentation conversions) and operating system mechanisms (such as process management, asynchronous event invocation, message buffering, and layer-to-layer flow control) that support the implementation and execution of protocol functions.

ACE is an object-oriented (OO) framework that provides a rich set of reusable C++ wrappers and framework components that perform common communication software tasks (mentioned in the paragraph above) across a range of operating system platforms. ACE simplifies the development of object oriented network applications and services that utilize common communication tasks.

The ACE framework has been widely accepted. Evidence of wide acceptance of ACE includes:

• ACE user mailing lists have been created, and they include approximately 1,200 members. 
• ACE has been ported to a wide range of uni-processor and multi-processor OS platforms including Win32, most versions of UNIX, Lynx, and MVS. There is also a Java version of ACE.
• Companies which use ACE include, just to name a few, Lucent Technologies, Bellcore, Cisco, DEC, Bell South Cellular Corp, Ericsson Radio, Motorola, Kodak, Boeing/McDonnel Douglas, Merrill Lynch, CERN (Switzerland), and Tadiran Telecommunications (Israel).

Selected Papers in the Adaptive Communication Environment (ACE)

[1] D. C. Schmidt and T. Suda, “A Framework for Measuring the Performance of Alternative Process Architectures for Parallel Communication Subsystems,” Network Performance Modeling and Simulation, Jean Walrand, Kallol Bagchi and George W. Zobrist, Ed., Gordon and Breach Publishers, April 1998.