Smart ecosystems are the drivers of modern society. They control critical infrastructures, ensuring their stable and sustainable operation. Smart ecosystems are governed by digital twins -- real-time virtual representations of physical infrastructure. To support the open-ended and reactive traits of smart ecosystems, digital twins need to be able to evolve in reaction to changing conditions. However, digital twin evolution is particularly challenging due to the intertwined nature of physical and software components. As a consequence, software practitioners find a substantial body of knowledge on software evolution hard to apply in digital twin evolution scenarios. In this article, we provide software practitioners with tangible leads toward understanding and managing the evolutionary concerns of digital twins. By that, we aim to bridge a significant gap in leveraging software engineering practices to develop robust smart ecosystems.

翻译：智能生态系统是现代社会的驱动力。它们控制关键基础设施，确保其稳定且可持续运行。智能生态系统由数字孪生——物理基础设施的实时虚拟表示——来治理。为支持智能生态系统的开放性和反应性特征，数字孪生需要能够随着条件变化而演化。然而，由于物理组件与软件组件的交织特性，数字孪生的演化尤为具有挑战性。因此，软件从业者发现，大量的软件演化知识难以直接应用于数字孪生的演化场景。本文为软件从业者提供切实可行的思路，以理解和应对数字孪生的演化问题。通过此举，我们旨在弥合利用软件工程实践构建稳健智能生态系统中的重大鸿沟。