New Directions in Cloud Programming

TL;DR

This paper proposes a new framework for cloud programming called PACT, aiming to simplify cloud development by separating programs into four facets and gradually migrating developers through a multi-stage compiler.

Contribution

It introduces the PACT model and a multi-stage compiler to ease the transition to more declarative cloud programming, addressing key research challenges.

Findings

PACT separates program semantics, availability, consistency, and targets.

A multi-stage compiler generates human-readable, tunable code.

The approach facilitates incremental adoption of cloud programming abstractions.

Abstract

Nearly twenty years after the launch of AWS, it remains difficult for most developers to harness the enormous potential of the cloud. In this paper we lay out an agenda for a new generation of cloud programming research aimed at bringing research ideas to programmers in an evolutionary fashion. Key to our approach is a separation of distributed programs into a PACT of four facets: Program semantics, Availablity, Consistency and Targets of optimization. We propose to migrate developers gradually to PACT programming by lifting familiar code into our more declarative level of abstraction. We then propose a multi-stage compiler that emits human-readable code at each stage that can be hand-tuned by developers seeking more control. Our agenda raises numerous research challenges across multiple areas including language design, query optimization, transactions, distributed consistency, compilers and program synthesis.