Zero-Local-Provisioning (ZLP): A General Framework for Collective Provisioning of Resources, Capabilities, and Attributes
Abstract
Many engineered, computational, organizational, and intelligent systems are designed under an implicit assumption: each individual object must locally possess the resources, capabilities, and operational attributes required to perform its intended functions. This assumption can lead to duplicated infrastructure, unnecessary configuration, underutilized capacity, and increased lifecycle costs. However, when objects can access compatible resources or services provided by other objects or shared infrastructure, some local provisioning requirements may be unnecessary.
This paper proposes Zero-Local-Provisioning (ZLP), a conceptual framework for investigating the collective provisioning of resources, capabilities, and operational attributes across heterogeneous systems. Its central principle is that the local configuration quantity of a specified provisionable trait may be zero for an individual object, provided that the relevant system-level requirements remain satisfied through collective resources, external services, alternative mechanisms, or permissible changes in system organization. Unlike approaches that merely share resources already present in individual objects, ZLP explicitly treats the absence of a locally provisioned trait as a permissible design decision.
The framework distinguishes object-level configuration from system-level functional satisfaction. It formalizes objects, provisionable traits, local configuration quantities, functional requirements, collective service assignments, compatibility, quality constraints, and lifecycle costs. A general optimization formulation jointly determines which traits each object should possess locally and how the remaining requirements should be satisfied collectively. The formulation supports both continuous quantities and discrete presence-or-absence decisions, including configurations in which selected traits have a local value of exactly zero.
The framework is intended to cover multiple classes of engineered systems, including computing infrastructure, sensing systems, storage and information services, energy systems, industrial equipment, transportation infrastructure, and distributed organizational services. Nevertheless, not every characteristic of every object is provisionable, transferable, or replaceable. ZLP therefore distinguishes operationally provisionable traits from intrinsic characteristics and explicitly incorporates feasibility, safety, compatibility, and reliability constraints.
This paper establishes a conceptual model, derives elementary decision conditions, proposes an implementation architecture, and presents a research methodology for empirical evaluation. It does not claim that collective provisioning is universally superior or that the proposed framework has already been demonstrated to be novel. Its principal research question is whether explicitly allowing selected object-level provisioning quantities to equal zero, while jointly optimizing system-level functional satisfaction, provides a useful and generalizable design methodology across distinct resource domains.
Related
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BibTeX
@misc{zhang2026zerolocalprovisioning,
title = {{Zero-Local-Provisioning (ZLP): A General Framework for Collective Provisioning of Resources, Capabilities, and Attributes}},
author = {Jincheng Zhang},
howpublished = {Zenodo},
year = {2026},
month = oct,
doi = {10.5281/zenodo.23450208},
url = {https://zenodo.org/records/23450208},
note = {CC BY 4.0},
}
RIS
TY - UNPB
TI - Zero-Local-Provisioning (ZLP): A General Framework for Collective Provisioning of Resources, Capabilities, and Attributes
AU - Jincheng Zhang
PY - 2026
DA - 2026/10/18
PB - Zenodo
DO - 10.5281/zenodo.23450208
UR - https://zenodo.org/records/23450208
AB - Many engineered, computational, organizational, and intelligent systems are designed under an implicit assumption: each individual object must locally possess the resources, capabilities, and operational attributes required to perform its intended functions. This assumption can lead to duplicated infrastructure, unnecessary configuration, underutilized capacity, and increased lifecycle costs. However, when objects can access compatible resources or services provided by other objects or shared infrastructure, some local provisioning requirements may be unnecessary. This paper proposes Zero-Local-Provisioning (ZLP), a conceptual framework for investigating the collective provisioning of resources, capabilities, and operational attributes across heterogeneous systems. Its central principle is that the local configuration quantity of a specified provisionable trait may be zero for an individual object, provided that the relevant system-level requirements remain satisfied through collective resources, external services, alternative mechanisms, or permissible changes in system organization. Unlike approaches that merely share resources already present in individual objects, ZLP explicitly treats the absence of a locally provisioned trait as a permissible design decision. The framework distinguishes object-level configuration from system-level functional satisfaction. It formalizes objects, provisionable traits, local configuration quantities, functional requirements, collective service assignments, compatibility, quality constraints, and lifecycle costs. A general optimization formulation jointly determines which traits each object should possess locally and how the remaining requirements should be satisfied collectively. The formulation supports both continuous quantities and discrete presence-or-absence decisions, including configurations in which selected traits have a local value of exactly zero. The framework is intended to cover multiple classes of engineered systems, including computing infrastructure, sensing systems, storage and information services, energy systems, industrial equipment, transportation infrastructure, and distributed organizational services. Nevertheless, not every characteristic of every object is provisionable, transferable, or replaceable. ZLP therefore distinguishes operationally provisionable traits from intrinsic characteristics and explicitly incorporates feasibility, safety, compatibility, and reliability constraints. This paper establishes a conceptual model, derives elementary decision conditions, proposes an implementation architecture, and presents a research methodology for empirical evaluation. It does not claim that collective provisioning is universally superior or that the proposed framework has already been demonstrated to be novel. Its principal research question is whether explicitly allowing selected object-level provisioning quantities to equal zero, while jointly optimizing system-level functional satisfaction, provides a useful and generalizable design methodology across distinct resource domains.
ER -