Building a Flexible Object-Group-Oriented Framework to support Large Scale Cooperative and Adaptive Applications

In this paper we examine the requirements of large scale cooperative applications, namely those alternating multi-part synchronous work sessions with variable periods of asynchronous interactions and disconnected work. We discuss the topological organization of the large scale cooperative space and the materialization of an integrated generic platform to support those requirements. Our approach emphasizes the need of an adequate programming support. We will describe and characterize an object-grouporiented layered and wrapped infrastructure as a contribution to build generic programming frameworks offering high degree of orthogonality and, consequently, high flexibility.