Prescriptions: A Language for Describing Software Configurations

Automation of software configuration management is an important practical problem. Any automated tool must work from some specifications of correct or desired configurations. This report introduces a language for describing acceptable configurations of common systems, so that automated management is possible. The proposed language is declarative, while at the same time there are efficient algorithms for modifying a system to conform to a specification in many cases of practical importance. Department of Computer Science University of British Columbia 2366 Main Mall, Vancouver, BC CANADA V6T 1Z4 1 Introduction Correct operation of computing systems depends upon correct configuration. Software is an essential part of any computing system, and contributes a great deal of complexity to the problem of configuration management. A typical computing system contains many instances of different software constructs such as files, directories, processes, tables, ports, sockets, mailb..