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In this thesis we will examine a telecom industry case, where combining synchronous and asynchronous interfaces causes problems. A solution to the problem is being presented in form of an interface controller framework that is based on patterns of common functionality of interface controllers. The solution is implemented using four different implementation methods (Java, Erlang, XDE, Executable UML), and compared in lines of code, performance and throughput. / I rapporten undersöks ett fall i telekominudstrin, där kombinerandet av synkrona och asynkrona interface orsakar problem. En lösning på problemet är presenterat i form av ett framework för interface controllers som är baserat på mönster som beskriver den gemensamma funktionaliten i interface controllers. Lösningen är implementerad med hjälp av fyra olika implementeringsmetoder (Java, Erlang, XDE och Executable UML), där rader kod och prestanda jämförs. / pt00cbj@student.bth.se pt00psa@student.bth.se

This thesis deals with illegal distribution of programs. It describes methods of licencing programs and ways their restrictions. It focuses on description basic tools and techniques used to program cracking. Farther this work describes structure of executables files on MS Windows. The work is completed with malware analysis for clarification techniques masking of code. This work is complemented by a demonstration application for program code masking.

This thesis explored the history of military simulations and linked it to the current challenges of interoperability. The research illustrated the challenge of interoperability in integrating different networks, databases, standards, and interfaces and how it results in U.S. Army organizations constantly spending time and money to create and implement irreproducible Live, Virtual, and Constructive (LVC) integrating architectures to accomplish comparable tasks. Although the U.S. Army has made advancements in interoperability, it has struggled with this challenge since the early 1990s. These improvements have been inadequate due to evolving and growing needs of the user coupled with the technical complexities of interoperating legacy systems with emergent systems arising from advances in technology. To better understand the impact of the continued evolution of simulations, this paper mapped Maslow's Hierarchy of Needs with Tolk's Levels of Conceptual Interoperability Model (LCIM). This mapping illustrated a common relationship in both the Hierarchy of Needs and the LCIM model depicting that each level increases with complexity and the proceeding lower level must first be achieved prior to reaching the next. Understanding the continuum of complexity of interoperability, as requirements or needs, helped to determine why the previous funding and technical efforts have been inadequate in mitigating the interoperability challenges within U.S. Army simulations. As the U.S. Army's simulation programs continue to evolve while the military and contractor personnel turnover rate remains near constant, a method of capturing and passing on the tacit knowledge from one personnel staffing life cycle to the next must be developed in order to economically and quickly reproduce complex simulation events. This thesis explored a potential solution to this challenge, the Executable Architecture Systems Engineering (EASE) research project managed by the U.S. Army’s Simulation and Training Technology Center in the Army Research Laboratory within the Research, Development and Engineering Command. However, there are two main drawbacks to EASE; it iv is still in the prototype stage and has not been fully tested and evaluated as a simulation tool within the community of practice. In order to determine if EASE has the potential to reduce the micro as well as macro interoperability, an EASE experiment was conducted as part of this thesis. The following three alternative hypothesis were developed, tested, and accepted as a result of the research for this thesis: Ha1 = Expert stakeholders believe the EASE prototype does have potential as a U.S. Army technical solution to help mitigate the M&S interoperability challenge. Ha2 = Expert stakeholders believe the EASE prototype does have potential as a U.S. Army managerial solution to help mitigate the M&S interoperability challenge. Ha3 = Expert stakeholders believe the EASE prototype does have potential as a U.S. Army knowledge management solution to help mitigate the M&S interoperability challenge. To conduct this experiment, eleven participants representing ten different organizations across the three M&S Domains were selected to test EASE using a modified Technology Acceptance Model (TAM) approach developed by Davis. Indexes were created from the participants’ responses to include both the quality of participants and research questions. The Cronbach Alpha Test for reliability was used to test the reliability of the adapted TAM. The Wilcoxon Signed Ranked test provided the statistical analysis that formed the basis of the research; that determined the EASE project has the potential to help mitigate the interoperability challenges in the U.S. Army's M&S domains.

<p>Software vulnerabilities in programs and malware deployments have been increasing almost every year since we started measuring them. Information about how to program securely, how malware shall be avoided and technological countermeasures for this are more available than ever. Still, the trend seems to favor the attacker. This thesis tries to visualize the effects of a selection of technological countermeasures that have been proposed by researchers. These countermeasures: non-executable memory, address randomization, system call interception and file integrity monitoring are described along with the attacks they are designed to defend against. The coverage of each countermeasure is then visualized with the help of attack trees. Attack trees are normally used for describing how systems can be attacked but here they instead serve the purpose of showing where in an attack a countermeasure takes effect. Using attack trees for this highlights a couple of important aspects of a security mechanism, such as how early in an attack it is effective and which variants of an attack it potentially defends against. This is done by the use of what we call defensive codes that describe how a defense mechanism counters a sub-goal in an attack. Unfortunately the whole process is not well formalized and depends on many uncertain factors.</p>

Gemeinsamer Workshop von Universitaetsrechenzentrum und Professur Rechnernetze und verteilte Systeme der Fakultaet fuer Informatik der TU Chemnitz. Jabber ist eine XML basierte Instant Messaging und Präsenz-Management Lösung. Dieser Vortrag beinhaltet einen Überblick über die grundlegenden Konzepte von Instant Messaging, die Betrachtung von Jabber, als IM-Alternative, die Dienste, die auf dem Jabber-Protokoll aufbauen und das Phänomen X-Internet, als Webdienstplattform.

One of the main notational contexts in which model-driven software development has been studied is the Unified Modeling Language (UML), the de facto standard in software modelling. The current trend in software development is not just towards the use of models, but the use of executable models. In 2006, the Object Management Group issued a Request for Proposal (RFP), soliciting the definition of an Executable UML Foundation, with a fully specified executable semantics. The purpose of such a version of UML is to make the advantages of executable models available to UML users by enabling "a chain of tools that support the construction, verification, translation, and execution" of models. An oft-voiced criticism of UML is its lack of a formal, unambiguous description of its semantics. In an effort to improve the support for model-driven development, especially with respect to executable modelling, the UML 2 specification introduced a novel three-layer semantics architecture. This architecture provides a stratification of the description of UML models that clearly separates 'low-level' behavioural specification mechanisms, such as actions, from 'high-level' behavioural formalisms, such as activities, state machines and interactions. Although UML describes the effect of actions, it does not provide either the concrete syntax or the formal semantics of an action language. Our research focuses on a top-to-bottom slice of the three-layer architecture. We formally define the execution semantics of two-thirds of UML actions, including the most complicated actions---invocation actions. Our formal definition is expressed in terms of state changes to a global state machine representing an executing UML model. Our work provides an alternate formalization to that of the current submission to the RFP and could be used to enhance that submission. To validate our formal semantics and to determine the usefulness of the three-layer architecture, we have created an interpreter for UML actions and activities. This interpreter was designed in accordance with the complex token passing semantics of UML and provides analysis capabilities that have been successfully used to identify problems even in published activity diagrams. In effect, we have created a tool that supports the construction, verification and execution of a subset of UML models, namely activities. Our handling of this slice of the three-layer architecture is a preliminary step to realizing the grander vision of general executable (and analyzable) models. / Thesis (Ph.D, Computing) -- Queen's University, 2009-01-12 20:16:47.738

Buffer overflow vulnerabilities continue to prevail and the sophistication of attacks targeting these vulnerabilities is continuously increasing. As a successful attack of this type has the potential to completely compromise the integrity of the targeted host, early detection is vital. This thesis examines generic approaches for detecting executable payload attacks, without prior knowledge of the implementation of the attack, in such a way that new and previously unseen attacks are detectable. Executable payloads are analysed in detail for attacks targeting the Linux and Windows operating systems executing on an Intel IA-32 architecture. The execution flow of attack payloads are analysed and a generic model of execution is examined. A novel classification scheme for executable attack payloads is presented which allows for characterisation of executable payloads and facilitates vulnerability and threat assessments, and intrusion detection capability assessments for intrusion detection systems. An intrusion detection capability assessment may be utilised to determine whether or not a deployed system is able to detect a specific attack and to identify requirements for intrusion detection functionality for the development of new detection methods. Two novel detection methods are presented capable of detecting new and previously unseen executable attack payloads. The detection methods are capable of identifying and enumerating the executable payload’s interactions with the operating system on the targeted host at the time of compromise. The detection methods are further validated using real world data including executable payload attacks.

One of the inevitable negative effects of software evolution is design erosion. Refactoring is a technique that aims at counteracting this phenomenon by successively improving the design of software without changing its observable behaviour. Design erosion occurs also in the context of executable UML models, i.e. models that are detailed enough to be automatically compiled to executable applications. This thesis presents results of a study on applying refactoring to the area of maintenance of executable UML models. It contains an overview of recent approaches to UML model refactoring and to executable modelling, followed by identification of refactoring areas in models built in Telelogic TAU, a state-of-the art UML CASE tool. It proposes a systematic approach to specification of both executable UML model refactorings as well as associated bad smells in models. Additionally, it shows how refactorings can be implemented in Telelogic TAU.

Understanding of business processes is becoming an important key factor for successful businesses and today many organizations are facing the lack of knowledge about the business processes that they are working on. Since the interaction between different business processes and different actors are becoming more common it is not only enough for employees to have knowledge about the business processes that they involve directly, but also they need to know about the other business processes in the organization. Unfortunately there is not enough research on this topic in the literature and the goal of this thesis is to propose a method for solving the indicated problem by increasing the understanding of business processes by the employees in an organization. The proposed method basically contains the design and execution of process models based on a real scenario. A case study has been conducted at an IT company where the employees have no or limited knowledge about the business processes that their organization works on. Even though the method has been only tested in one organization it is generic and can be applied to any other similar organization. The design science approach is used to develop the method and build the process models as artifacts. The process models have been verified by using an executable business modeling tool, iPB, and presented to the employees in a seminar in order to make them to understand the business processes better. The knowledge of the employees about the business processes has been analyzed before and after the presentation, thus we could compare the results and find out how much their knowledge has increased after the presentation. The results have shown that the knowledge of the employees has increased significantly. In conclusion, the method of design and presentation of executable business process models has been proved to be a solution to the problem of not understanding of business processes in an organization well enough.