There were some very interesting papers at this year's conference.  Some of them focused on the implementation of various "special needs" JVMs. One, a distributed JVM, was designed to run java programs over a cluster transparently.  A check-pointing JVM was described as well.

JimWaldo gave the closing address.  He pointed out that part of making systems more adaptable over a network is the ability to evolve protocol all the way down. JiniTechnology works this way.  Protocol is a private matter between services.  If I want to use your service, you hand me a proxy.  What we do from that point on is our own business.  He mentioned something called GildersLaw as well: "bandwidth doubles every 12 mo."  Interesting implication when you compare it to MooresLaw (18 mo.).  It could generally become be faster to move bits around than to compute with them. 


-- MichaelFeathers