  We start with a discussion of the relevant literature, including Nature
Inspired Computing as a framework in which to understand this work, and the
process of biomimicry to be used in mimicking the necessary biological
processes to create Digital Ecosystems. We then consider the relevant
theoretical ecology in creating the digital counterpart of a biological
ecosystem, including the topological structure of ecosystems, and evolutionary
processes within distributed environments. This leads to a discussion of the
relevant fields from computer science for the creation of Digital Ecosystems,
including evolutionary computing, Multi-Agent Systems, and Service-Oriented
Architectures. We then define Ecosystem-Oriented Architectures for the creation
of Digital Ecosystems, imbibed with the properties of self-organisation and
scalability from biological ecosystems, including a novel form of distributed
evolutionary computing.
