Chairholders
Profile
Ferhat Khendek
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Concordia University
Chair title
NSERC/Ericsson Industrial Research Chair on Model-Based Software Management
Chair program
Industrial Research Chairs program
Role
Senior Chairholder since 2011
Summary
Cloud computing is a paradigm that enables pervasive access to computing resources through the internet. Cloud providers deliver computing infrastructure or software as a service to users who pay per use. Cloud computing is enabling novel applications in the internet of things that take advantage of cloud computing power and communication bandwidth. Cloud computing is at the brink of massive-scale deployment or ubiquity. The main obstacles are availability, security and management. Cloud systems must be scalable, adapt to the workload and make efficient use of resources. They must exhibit the required level of performance, and be continuously available, as we will become more and more dependent on cloud services. These requirements are difficult to meet, as cloud systems undergo very frequent upgrades. For the systems to remain available, these upgrades must be performed live, i.e., while the system is providing services.
The goals of the second term of the chair are to tackle new research issues in the cloud settings, such as a requirement-engineering framework for cloud systems, including functional and non-functional requirements; on-the-fly discovery/selection, composition, configuration, reconfiguration of cloud systems and enabling architectures; service level agreement (SLA) management, including monitoring techniques for cloud systems; live upgrade of cloud systems and live testing/diagnostics of cloud systems. The program will develop techniques and approaches for the selection, composition, configuration, deployment, upgrade, live testing/diagnosis, and monitoring of cloud systems. These techniques and approaches will take into account functional and non-functional properties such as scalability, availability and other performance characteristics.
The research program for the second term is building on the achievements of the first term, during which major results were achieved on high-availability management in the cluster environment. During the first term, the chair contributed significantly to software management, configuration and upgrading, with novel techniques and architectures based on the model-driven paradigm. These research findings have been achieved through a close collaboration with Ericsson, a major player in research and development in Canada, and the findings have been transferred to final products to strengthen Ericsson’s position among computing and telecommunications industries in the global and competitive market.
This university-industry partnership provides students with tangible experience at both Concordia University and Ericsson, which gives the students a competitive edge as they enter the workforce and equips them with skills to strengthen Canada's leadership in the management of software systems.
The NSERC/Ericsson Industrial Research Chair on Model-Based Software Management is held by Dr. Ferhat Khendek. A professor in Concordia University's Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, he is an internationally renowned expert in software systems modelling and their design and validation. His collaborations with Ericsson have been successful and longstanding.
Partner
- Ericsson Canada Inc.
Contact information
Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering
Concordia University
Email: ferhat.khendek@concordia.ca
