Enabling pervasive computing with smart phones

Mobile telephony's technical and market success in Europe attracted researchers' interest in mobile systems. Some researchers began investigating appropriate architectures for providing information services to cellular mobile telephony users, and the quest for the "killer" third-generation (3G) mobile telephony application dominated the EU Information Society Technology research program. Dozens of projects launched to pursue this aim, and we were intimately involved in several of them. We report here on lessons learned during our involvement in this research and suggest how pervasive computing might benefit from this experience. Although some business and practical challenges exist, mobile phones could serve as information service end points, control devices for ubiquitous systems, network hubs for personal and body area networks, and ID tokens.     

Universal interactions with smart spaces

A critical challenge facing the pervasive computing research community is the need to manage complex interactions among numerous interconnected computers and devices. In such a pervasive space, a given application's functionalities are partitioned and distributed across several computing devices that are spontaneously discovered and used. In recent years, researchers have devoted much attention to universal interactions with diverse devices in richly networked settings. We can categorize the numerous approaches explored into two groups: universal user interface languages and user interface remoting. We review recent noteworthy efforts for universal interactions using these two approaches. Such efforts aim to raise interoperability in interactive smart spaces by standardizing user interface languages or communication protocols.     

Enabling distributed Corba access to smart card applications

The OrbCard framework uses Corba wrapper technology to extend smart card services to a distributed computing environment     

Nomadic computing and smart spaces

Currently, most users think of their computers as associated with their desktop appliances or with a server located in a dungeon in some mysterious basement. However, many of those same users can be considered nomads, in that they carry computers and communication devices with them in their travels between office, home, airport, hotel, automobile, and so on. Access to the Internet is necessary not only from one's “home base”, but also while in transit and after reaching one's destination. A number of capabilities must be put in place to support this new paradigm of nomadicity. Among these, we can include independence of location, motion, platform, and, with widespread presence, of access to remote files, systems, and services. Essentially, one seeks to provide the illusion of connectivity even when the nomad is disconnected and to provide seamless access to Internet services wherever the nomad travels. To achieve this, not only must the infrastructure be enhanced to provide these capabilities, but applications must become nomadically enabled as well. These ideas form the essence of the major shift to nomadic computing. But nomadic computing is merely the first step of the vision foreseen by the author. The next step will take us out of the netherworld of cyberspace and into the physical world of smart spaces. Environments will come alive with embedded technology, so that no longer will we see Internet services as coming to us from the screen on a computer, but rather those services will be embedded in the environment     

Semantic Space: an infrastructure for smart spaces

Semantic Space is a pervasive computing infrastructure that exploits semantic Web technologies to support explicit representation, expressive querying, and flexible reasoning of contexts in smart spaces.     

Exploiting smart spaces for interactive TV applications development

The integration of semantic technologies and TV services is a substantial innovation to improve the services to users in an environment that is extended beyond the fixed home environment. But currently, this integration is mainly limited to provide personalized recommendation services and systems by matching user static preferences. Designing and development of interactive TV (iTV) applications using semantic technologies are not realized yet. In this work, we explore the potential of introduction semantic technologies and smart spaces in design and development of iTV applications. We use an example scenario to show how future iTV applications include the mesh-up of information from different sources. We proposed a methodology and show how ontology-driven approach can help to design and develop these iTV applications. We demonstrate the suitability of our ontology-driven application development tools and rule-based approach for the development of highly dynamic context-aware iTV applications.     

Intelligent agents meet the semantic Web in smart spaces

A new smart meeting room system called EasyMeeting explores the use of multi-agent systems, Semantic Web ontologies, reasoning, and declarative policies for security and privacy. Building on an earlier pervasive computing system, EasyMeeting provides relevant services and information to meeting participants based on their situational needs. The system also exploits the context-aware support provided by the Context Broker Architecture (Cobra). Cobra's intelligent broker agent maintains a shared context model for all computing entities in the space and enforces user-defined privacy policies.     

动态AOP与OSGi服务平台集成技术

经典的软件工程方法往往导致软件重新部署,甚至软件迁移。因此松耦合的软件设计和动态适应模型是及其重要的。动态面向方面编程(D-AOP),非常适合这种需求。本文介绍一个OSGi与D-AOP集成的框架,建立适应动态变化的核心关切面,以及横切关注点。D-AOP框架的无缝集成是通过切面映射的部署和取消部署到OSGi的bundle生命周期,而不影响原有部署模型。     

基于OSGi平台家庭网关的远程监控服务系统

针对数字家庭网络应用环境,研究远程家庭监控服务问题,将OSGi平台与Java媒体框架技术相结合,提出了一种使用方便、费用低廉的基于OSGi平台家庭网关的视频监控系统架构,描述了系统分析与设计过程,并采用Java媒体框架予以实现,实验证明该系统能够有效地实现远程监控服务,具有扩展灵活,部署方便、节约费用的特点.该架构和开发技术可应用于其它数字家庭应用系统中.     

基于OSGi的LBS终端系统

简要介绍LBS的概念与发展情况,提出研究项目,即一个能提供位置服务的移动终端系统;简单介绍OSGi规范以及这个规范的优点;之后叙述此终端系统的位置更新策略;探讨这个移动终端系统的设计与一些实现的细节问题;介绍系统的工作流程;最后说明实验结果并进行总结,得出进一步学习OSGi的必要性。     

Enabling ubiquitous sensing with RFID

Radio frequency identification has attracted considerable press attention in recent years, and for good reasons: RFID not only replaces traditional barcode technology, it also provides additional features and removes boundaries that limited the use of previous alternatives. Printed bar codes are typically read by a laser-based optical scanner that requires a direct line-of-sight to detect and extract information. With RFID, however, a scanner can read the encoded information even when the tag is concealed for either aesthetic or security reasons. In the future, RFID tags will likely be used as environmental sensors on an unprecedented scale.     

OSGi(开放服务网关标准)在IA(信息家电)开发中的应用

本文在分析了IA(信息家电)良好的发展前景之后，讨论了与之密切相关的RG(家庭网关)的现状。接着在客观比较各种家庭网关标准优缺点的基础上，提出了在IA(信息家电)的开发中推广应用OSGi(开放服务网关标准)的思想，并给出了OSGi应用程序的开发实例。     

OSGi服务缓存的一种动态管理方法

服务缓存有利于提高面向服务的体系结构的系统性能和安全性,其模式和服务依赖模式紧密相关.通过分析OSGi服务缓存模式存在的不足,在改进OSGi服务依赖模式的基础上,提出了一种基于服务依赖图的动态服务缓存模式及其自动管理方法,并给出了具体实现方案,包括服务缓存的替换算法,最后提出了服务缓存效率的评价指标.     

OPTIMUS:online persistent tracking and identification of many users for smart spaces

A smart space, which is embedded with networked sensors and smart devices, can provide various useful services to its users. For the success of a smart space, the problem of tracking and identification of smart space users is of paramount importance. We propose a system, called Optimus, for persistent tracking and identification of users in a smart space, which is equipped with a camera network. We assume that each user carries a smartphone in a smart space. A camera network is used to solve the problem of tracking multiple users in a smart space and information from smartphones is used to identify tracks. For robust tracking, we first detect human subjects from images using a head detection algorithm based on histograms of oriented gradients. Then, human detections are combined to form tracklets and delayed track-level association is used to combine tracklets to build longer trajectories of users. Last, accelerometers in smartphones are used to disambiguate identities of trajectories. By linking identified trajectories, we show that the average length of a track can be lengthened by over six times. The performance of the proposed system is evaluated extensively in realistic scenarios.     

Integrating service discovery technologies in OSGi platform

This paper describes the service discovery and interaction for home network devices using heterogeneous standards and protocols. OSGi was proposed to allow several kinds of services coming from different providers to be loaded and run on a gateway. We present a residential gateway based on the OSGi architecture for a smart home network. We combine the SLP SA/DA, the UPnP control point and the SIP UA into the gateway to achieve automated device discovery, registry, and management. Application examples are introduced and the implementation results show that our gateway can provide automatic heterogeneous service or device discovery, registry, and management.     

基于分布式OSGi的通用电力数据平台

提升智能电网中各种异构应用软件间的数据共享和功能交互能力,是电力企业亟需解决的问题。而依靠标准化数据模型、SOA等技术的传统交互方案对模块运行期热插拔、分布式编程模型低侵入性和电力数据持续变化的支持度不足。为此,以电力数据为中心,从软件架构角度,将电力应用解耦为数据总线和数据插件,提出一种基于分布式开放式服务网关(OSGi)的通用电力数据平台。阐述平台拓扑架构、分布式OSGi的扩展方法及通用电力元数据模型,给出平台在福建电网的实施方法,并对典型业务模块的功能及并发性能进行测试,结果表明,该平台能有效降低异构电力应用间的数据共享和功能交互难度。     

Enabling Change

Enabling continued, steady change requires that we integrate design corrections and adjustments into the natural course of development.     

This is not classified: everyday information seeking and encountering in smart urban spaces

We present a multipronged comparative study of citizens’ self-proclaimed information needs and actual information seeking behavior in smart urban spaces. We first conducted several user studies to identify the types of information services that citizens believed to be useful in urban setting utilizing methods ranging from contextual inquiry with lo-fi prototypes to “card sorting” exercise with a separate set of participants, and finally to implementing selected services. We then made a sizeable constructive intervention into the urban space by deploying in a city center 12 large, interactive public displays called “hotspots” to offer a wide range of previously identified information services. We collected comprehensive qualitative and quantitative data on the usage of the hotspots and their services by the general public during 13 months. Our study reveals discrepancies between a priori and a posteriori information seeking strategies extracted from the self-proclaimed information needs and the actual usage of the hotspots.     

基于OSGi的面向服务软件体系结构设计

为了实现企业级应用的基础架构、开发方式和部署方式的统一,文中研究了O SGi服务组件模型。O SGi提供了一种面向服务的组件开发框架,具有高度模块化和动态化特点。根据SOA架构思想和OSGi框架特性,设计一种基于OSGi规范的面向服务的软件体系结构,开发了统一服务架构平台,并通过组件化、图形化为设计、开发及调试等过程提供全生命周期的支持,实现了企业应用即插即用的模块化管理,能够有效提高软件模块复用能力和复用程度。