Emerald | International Journal of Pervasive Computing and Communications

A survey on internet-enabled physical annotation systems

Ahmad A. Alzahrani, Seng W. Loke, Hongen Lu — 2011-11-22 00:00:00.0

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to investigate the related issues of physical annotation systems and also to study their historical development. Moreover, the paper provides a taxonomy of physical annotation systems, including augmented reality systems and concludes with future challenges concerning such systems. Design/methodology/approach – The authors first provide a review and a comparison of existing physical annotation systems. The authors' classification of the physical annotation systems is based on the capabilities they provide. Findings – Physical annotation systems evolve as technology progresses. However, there are issues such as cognitive overload, trust, transient associations, and integrating of social networking with physical annotations. Research limitations/implications – As technology develops, physical annotations will become increasingly important in daily life. Hence, there are important research issues to address with regards to physical annotation systems. Practical implications – New better physical annotation systems are needed, which will change the way we do things in life, including personal memory, tourism, commerce, security, games, traffic management, entertainment and health. Social implications – Physical annotation systems will affect the relationships between people, between people and places and between people and things. There is a potential shift in the way people view the physical world, not only as what we see but as what we see through the devices we carry. Originality/value – The paper is an original review of physical annotation systems; there does not seem to be many such reviews on this area. The paper presents a set of future challenges regarding such systems.

MWSMF: a mediation framework for mobile hosts and enterprise on cloud

Satish Narayana Srirama — 2011-11-22 00:00:00.0

Abstract

Purpose – Web services are going mobile. A mobile enterprise can be established in a cellular network by participating mobile hosts, which act as web service providers, and their clients. Mobile hosts enable seamless integration of user-specific services to the enterprise, by following web service standards, also on the radio link and via resource constrained smart phones. However, establishing such a mobile enterprise poses several technical challenges, such as the quality of service (QoS), discovery aspects and proper integration solutions, for the network as well as for the mobile phone users. The purpose of this paper is to summarize the challenges and research associated with this domain and with establishing the mobile enterprise. Design/methodology/approach – The paper summarizes the challenges and research in the mobile web services domain, along with a detailed discussion of the developed mobile web service mediation framework (MWSMF). MWSMF is realized based on the enterprise service bus (ESB) technology, as an intermediary between mobile hosts and web service clients. Moreover, to scale the mobile enterprise to the loads possible in cellular networks, some of the components of MWSMF are shifted to the new utility computing paradigm, cloud computing. Findings – From the study it was found that ESB provides a good integration solution for the mobile enterprise research challenges. The detailed analysis of the MWSMF concludes that the mediation framework and its components are horizontally scalable, thus allowing to utilize elasticity of cloud platform to meet load requirements of mobile enterprise in an easy and quick manner. Originality/value – The study addresses the research with providing services from smart phones and establishing mobile enterprise. The QoS challenges are addressed and the study introduces an integration framework using ESB technology. The porting of MWSMF onto the cloud is also addressed. As an added value, the research serves as a case study for porting enterprise applications to the cloud.

Perception framework for supporting development of context-aware web services

Ekaterina Gilman, Xiang Su, Oleg Davidyuk, Jiehan Zhou, Jukka Riekki — 2011-11-22 00:00:00.0

Abstract

Purpose – Context-awareness is an essential property of any pervasive system perceiving its environment. Such a system captures and processes context, i.e. the features describing the relevant aspects of environment state and user behaviour. However, development of these systems still requires solving a number of research and engineering challenges. The purpose of this paper is to propose perception framework, a RESTful middleware which simplifies and accelerates the development of pervasive systems. Perception framework allows constructing services' application logic using rules and context. Moreover, it collects sensor data and produces the context information that is required for the rules. The authors present the architecture, design, complete implementation, and prototype-based verification of perception framework. Design/methodology/approach – Development of context-aware services is achieved with a novel architecture supporting building of the logic of web services using rules which directly manipulate the available elementary context represented with the Web Ontology Language (OWL) ontology. These rules are described using the Rule Interchange Format (RIF) with support for different rule languages. The implementation of this framework is aligned with RESTful principles, providing a lightweight and flexible solution for large-scale context-aware systems. Findings – The fully implemented prototype verifies the feasibility of constructing the logic of context-aware web services with the rules supported by perception framework. Originality/value – The contributions of this paper include: the requirement specification for a generic context-aware pervasive middleware; and the design and implementation of the framework (i.e. perception framework) supporting the development of context-aware web services. The perception framework includes a generic rule-based reasoner allowing developers to use several RIF-compliant rule description languages.

Towards probabilistic arbitration in sensors integration

Shazirawati Mohd Puzi, Shaharuddin Salleh, Ruzana Ishak, Stephan Olariu — 2011-11-22 00:00:00.0

Abstract

Purpose – The purpose of this paper is to model an important aspect of the problem of sensor information integration that arises in wireless communications, where N sensors try to communicate with a receiver using a single un-shareable radio channel. If several sensors transmit at the same time, their transmissions collide at the receiver resulting in garbled messages and the need for re-transmission. This is highly undesirable since the sensors are energy-constrained and the radio interface is known to be the most significant source of energy expenditure. Consequently, it is of paramount importance to design arbitration protocols that are highly efficient in stamping out collisions and that are, at the same time, as lightweight as possible. Design/methodology/approach – The receiver advertises a time division multiple access (TDMA) frame consisting of n slots, numbered from 1 to n, where n is an application-dependent parameter. Each sensor generates uniformly at random, and independently of other sensor, an integer i between 1 and n and transmits in the i-th slot of the TDMA frame. If two or more sensors are transmitting in the same slot their messages will be lost to collision. Similarly, slots that carry no transmission are wasted. The authors model the arbitration strategy discussed above as a Bose-Einstein occupancy problem where N indistinguishable balls are thrown at random into n distinguishable bins and all distinguishable outcomes are considered to be equally likely. Findings – In this paper the authors present a distributed probabilistic mechanism that aims to arbitrate between several competing requests by various sensors for the radio channel. The mechanism is simple, energy-efficient and does not rely on the existence of unique sensor identifiers (IDs). Originality/value – The Bose-Einstein occupancy model presented in this paper will help the receiver to tailor an appropriate number of timeslots in TDMA frame during the integration process, such that collisions are minimized, and hence integration between sensors can be done effectively.

m:Ciudad: enabling end-user mobile service creation

2011-11-22 00:00:00.0

Abstract

Purpose – Mobile computing enables end-users to create small services on their mobiles and share valuable and context-aware information with others. The purpose of this paper is to introduce a platform for end-user generated mobile services – so-called microservices. Design/methodology/approach – As a key component the authors present a microservice description language for user-driven mobile service creation and platform-independent service execution and rendering. The paper also gives insight into the authors' visual authoring tool. The chosen design approach is evaluated in two phases: an intermediate evaluation with a small hands-on trial and an online survey; and a final laboratory test with 24 test users in total. Findings – The paper provides empirical insights about the methods and motivations of end-users creating small mobile services. The main purposes of service creation would be mostly to exchange information, stay in contact, and just for fun (on the basis of non-commercial use). The evaluations also indicate the visual drag and drop approach of putting service blocks together as being the most favored in terms of user satisfaction. Originality/value – The concepts and findings introduced in this paper will help in designing mobile service authoring environments, which is appealing to software communities/vendors and mobile network operators. The presented platform is, to the authors' knowledge, the first designed and implemented infrastructure enabling end-user mobile service creation.

Editorial

2011-11-22 00:00:00.0