Composition Machines: Programming Self-Organising Software Models for the Emergence of Sequential Program Spaces

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel abstract machine called the composition machine that facilitates the emergence of multiple programs simultaneously through self-organising models, addressing the complexity of large software systems.

Contribution

It proposes a new abstract machine framework that enables the emergence of multiple programs at once, advancing the design of self-organising software models.

Findings

Demonstrates the machine's operation with Boolean logic rules

Shows emergence of multiple programs from simple rules

Provides formal semantics for the composition machine

Abstract

We are entering a new era in which software systems are becoming more and more complex and larger. So, the composition of such systems is becoming infeasible by manual means. To address this challenge, self-organising software models represent a promising direction since they allow the (bottom-up) emergence of complex computational structures from simple rules. In this paper, we propose an abstract machine, called the composition machine, which allows the definition and the execution of such models. Unlike typical abstract machines, our proposal does not compute individual programs but enables the emergence of multiple programs at once. We particularly present the machine's semantics and provide examples to demonstrate its operation with well-known rules from the realm of Boolean logic and elementary cellular automata.