Convergence agent model for developing u-healthcare systems

Ubiquitous networking, the interlinking of computers, consumer electronics, automobiles, home appliances, medical equipment, transportation systems, animals and plants through an overlapping of electronic spaces and physical spaces, is expected to provide an environment that enhances our lives through improved convenience, efficiency and safety in all areas.Today’s healthcare industry emphasizes safety, efficiency, patient-oriented approach, timeliness and balance. u-healthcare makes it possible to safely deliver appropriate services from any location at any time. To explain the emergence of u-healthcare, one must invoke, first of all, progress in IT and medical technology, and then the desire and willingness on the part of health care institutions to adopt the new service concept and increased health care demand. Digitalization of information, introduction of broadband communication and leaps made in healthcare technology in recent years have provided the technological capacity necessary for the achievement of u-healthcare.Based on recently reached theoretical results, integrating u-healthcare environments in virtual organizations, we proposed a methodology for the design and implementation of u-healthcare, linking the distributed mobile agents with medical entities into a convergence and collaborative environment. Despite the challenges in implementing and deploying u-healthcare, the advantages of ubiquitous healthcare are enabled by our smart model for the soft computing endowed ubiquitous. The strength of our approach is that it relates to u-healthcare a system which consists of its dual character emerging from the synergetic interaction between ubiquitous computing techniques and the mobile devices in convergence manner. We have developed a set of initial healthcare agent services on the mobile collaboration framework. We evaluate the functionality and effectiveness of our convergence mobile agent, whether the platform can manage services based on the model and whether the results of u-healthcare services discovery could satisfy user’s requirements with example cases.     

Location-based services in ubiquitous computing environments

This paper presents a framework for providing dynamically deployable services in ubiquitous computing settings. The goal of the framework is to provide people, places, and objects with computational functionalities to support and annotate them. Using RFID-based tracking systems, the framework detects the locations of physical entities, such as people or things, and deploys services bound to the entities at proper computing devices near where they are located. It enables location-based and personalized information services to be implemented as mobile agents and operated at stationary or mobile computing devices, which are at appropriate locations, even if the services do not have any location-information. This paper presents the rationale, design, implementation, and applications of our prototype infrastructure.     

面向普适计算环境的Android平台服务编排框架

普适计算环境下的智能移动设备是面向终端用户的服务资源聚集和编排的主要载体。普适计算环境中的服务资源具有多种不同的形态,包括基于互联网提供的Web服务、终端设备自身服务和资源(例如本地应用、自带传感器)以及所处环境中可访问的服务(例如环境传感器)。此外,不断变化的上下文环境对软件本身的自适应能力提出了新的要求,而移动设备上的服务编排受设备计算能力和资源的限制。为了解决上述问题,提出了一个面向普适计算环境的Android平台服务编排框架ASOF。通过ASOF,移动终端可在运行时获取所需业务流程的服务模板,并对该模板中的抽象服务进行服务绑定,实现轻量级的混合服务编排,使终端能够动态获得调用普适计算环境中各种类型的服务的能力。随后,基于OSGi Felix框架给出了一套ASOF的标准实现,并以一个具体案例验证其有效性。     

Accessible user interface support for multi-device ubiquitous applications: architectural modifiability considerations

The market for personal computing devices is rapidly expanding from PC, to mobile, home entertainment systems, and even the automotive industry. When developing software targeting such ubiquitous devices, the balance between development costs and market coverage has turned out to be a challenging issue. With the rise of Web technology and the Internet of things, ubiquitous applications have become a reality. Nonetheless, the diversity of presentation and interaction modalities still drastically limit the number of targetable devices and the accessibility toward end users. This paper presents webinos, a multi-device application middleware platform founded on the Future Internet infrastructure. Hereto, the platform’s architectural modifiability considerations are described and evaluated as a generic enabler for supporting applications, which are executed in ubiquitous computing environments.     

Clairvoyance: A framework to integrate shared displays and mobile computing devices

Supporting formal and informal meetings with digital information and ubiquitous software systems every day becomes increasingly mandatory. These meetings require that the integration of devices participating in the meeting and the information flow among them should be done as seamless as possible to avoid jeopardizing the natural interactions among participants. Trying to contribute to address such a challenge, this article presents a framework that allows devices integration and smooth information flow. This framework, named Clairvoyance, particularly integrates mobile computing devices and large-screen TVs through a mobile ad hoc network, and thus it eases the implementation of shared displays intended to be used in formal and informal meetings. Clairvoyance provides a set of services through an API, which can be used to develop ubiquitous applications that support meetings in particular scenarios. The preliminary evaluation of this framework considered its usage to implement a ubiquitous system that supports social meetings among friends or relatives. According to developers, the framework is easy to use and it provided all required services for such an application. The solution obtained was then utilized by end-users in simulated meetings. The evaluation results indicate that the Clairvoyance services were suitable to support the informal meetings, and that the devices integration and information flow were transparent for the end-users.     

An effective authentication mechanism for ubiquitous collaboration in heterogeneous computing environment

With the advent of new generation of mobile access devices such as smartphone and tablet PC, there is coming a need for ubiquitous collaboration which allows people to access information systems with their disparate access devices and to communicate with others in anytime and in anywhere. As the number of collaborators with a large number of disparate access devices increases in ubiquitous collaboration environment, the difficulties for protecting secured resources from unauthorized users as well as unsecured access devices will increase since the resources can be compromised by inadequately secured human and devices. Therfore, authentication mechanism for access of legitimate participants is essential in ubiquitous collaboration environment. In this paper we present an efficient authentication mechanism in ubiquitous collaboration environment. We show that proposed scheme is secure through security analysis and is efficient through the experimental results obtained from the practical evaluation of the scheme in ubiquitous collaboration environment.     

Smart devices and spaces for pervasive computing

Applications and services for pervasive computing have been dramatically grown and have contributed extensively to our daily experiences in recent years. Smart systems, devices, and spaces are proactive for ubiquitous and pervasive computing. Smart information technology (IT) is also an outcome of the state of the art and novel mobile and ubiquitous computing technologies that include highly capable handheld device, pervasive and personal device, etc. This special issue will be a trigger for further related research and technology improvements in pervasive and ubiquitous computing using smart devices and services. This special issue called for original papers describing the latest developments, trends, and solutions of smart devices and spaces for pervasive computing including real-time operating systems (OS), tiny OS and middleware supports, mobile system performance, trustworthy Internet and communications, agents and mobile and pervasive services, among others. In particular, this special issue focuses on a remote control and media-sharing system, flash storage-based smart system, heterogeneous mobile OS, and prediction and auto-execution system for pervasive computing.     

An ECA-based framework for decentralized coordination of ubiquitous web services

Emerging ubiquitous computing network is expected to consist of a variety of heterogeneous and distributed devices. While web services technology is increasingly being considered as a promising solution to support the inter-operability between such heterogeneous devices via well-defined protocol, currently there is no effective framework reported in the literature that can address the problem of coordinating the web services-enabled devices. This paper considers a ubiquitous computing environment that is comprised of active, autonomous devices interacting with each other through web services, and presents an ECA (Event-Condition-Action)-based framework for effective coordination of those devices. Specifically, we first present an XML-based language for describing ECA rules that are embedded in web service-enabled devices. An ECA rule, when triggered by an internal or external event to the device, can result in the invocation of appropriate web services in the system. Subsequently, we consider the situation in which the rules are introduced and managed by multiple, independent users, and propose effective mechanisms that can detect and resolve potential inconsistencies among the rules. The presented ECA-based coordination approach is expected to facilitate seamless inter-operation among the web service-enabled devices in the emerging ubiquitous computing environments.     

Resource collaboration system based on dynamic user preference and context

In a ubiquitous computing environment, service composition and collaboration among heterogeneous resources are required, thus, an infrastructure that supports these requirements is an essential factor in seamless service delivery. In this environment, users hope to get a variety of customized services by using only an individual mobile device. But the resource of the mobile device has limitations such as tiny display screens, limited input, less powerful processors, and limited storage. Moreover each user situation is different and user preferences are also various. Therefore it is one of new issues to provide a customized service for a user through resource collaboration based on various user preference and situation. To solve this issue, this paper proposes a resource collaboration system which infers customized resources for composing a user required service and collaborative with selected resources. For our collaboration system, this paper proposes the method to infer resources based on the context and user preferences including dynamic change of the preference. This paper also shows a reasonable execution environment for the proposed system through the performance evaluation in server-client and peer-to-peer environments.     

A lightweight active service migration framework for computational offloading in mobile cloud computing

Cloud computing enables access to the widespread services and resources in cloud datacenters for mitigating resource limitations in low-potential client devices. Computational cloud is an attractive platform for computational offloading due to the attributes of scalability and availability of resources. Therefore, mobile cloud computing (MCC) leverages the application processing services of computational clouds for enabling computational-intensive and ubiquitous mobile applications on smart mobile devices (SMDs). Computational offloading frameworks focus on offloading intensive mobile applications at different granularity levels which involve resource-intensive mechanism of application profiling and partitioning at runtime. As a result, the energy consumption cost (ECC) and turnaround time of the application is increased. This paper proposes an active service migration (ASM) framework for computational offloading to cloud datacenters, which employs lightweight procedure for the deployment of runtime distributed platform. The proposed framework employs coarse granularity level and simple developmental and deployment procedures for computational offloading in MCC. ASM is evaluated by benchmarking prototype application on the Android devices in the real MCC environment. It is found that the turnaround time of the application reduces up to 45 % and ECC of the application reduces up to 33 % in ASM-based computational offloading as compared to traditional offloading techniques which shows the lightweight nature of the proposed framework for computational offloading.     

普适计算的信任认证

在普适计算环境中，用户能够在任何时间、任何地点访问资源，获得服务。但是这种无处不在性和移动性的环境带来了新的安全问题。资源的拥有者和请求者一般互相不知道。认证是安全的基石，没有认证，系统的保密性、完整性和可用性都将受到影响。可是传统认证是基于身份的认证，不适合普适环境中对陌生实体的认证。本文在分析普适计算的认证要求后，指出了在普适计算环境中应该先在陌生的实体间建立信任关系，然后可以用几乎所有的标准密钥交换协议进行安全认证。提出了用资源限制信任协商技术在陌生人之间建立信任关系。由于它避免了大量的公钥密码操作所带来的计算负担，因此比较适合计算能力有限的设备之间建立信任关系。     

新型算力网络架构及其应用案例分析

随着人工智能（AI）算力向网络边缘甚至终端设备扩散,端边云超协同的算力网络成为最佳计算解决方案,而新机遇催生了端边云超计算和网络之间的深度集成。然而,集成系统的完整开发还没有得到很好的解决,包括适应性、灵活性和价值性,因此提出了一种区块链赋能的端边云超算力网络架构。其中,端边云超融合为框架提供基础设施,该设施构成的算力资源池为用户提供安全可靠的算力,网络通过调度资源满足用户需求,而框架内的神经网络和执行平台为AI任务执行提供接口;同时,区块链保证资源交易的可靠性,以激励更多算力贡献者加入平台。本框架为算力网络中的用户提供了适应性,为组网算力资源调度提供了灵活性,为算力供应商提供了价值激励,并利用案例清晰地描述了该新型算力网络架构。     

The Mobile-Stationary Divide in Ubiquitous Computing Environments: Lessons from the Transport Industry

The emergence of ubiquitous computing offers new possibilities and opportunities for organizations attempting to improve their productivity and effectiveness. in particular, the promises of ubiquitous computing are attractive to organizations such as transport firms, in which coordination of diverse sets of mobile units is central to organizational performance. This article analyzes the use of ubiquitous transport systems in Swedish road haulage firms and discusses the opportunities and challenges for the early adopters. It pays specific attention to the mobile-stationary divide; that is, the set of challenges associated with integration of mobile and stationary people and systems into a seamless computing environment.     

基于信任的普适计算安全机制

在普通计算环境中，用户能够在任何时间任何地点访问资源，获得服务。但是这种无处不在性和移动性的环境带来了新的安全问题。资源的拥有者和请求者一般互相不知道。该文给出了主体的信任策略以及基于信仟的普适计算环境认证方法和访问拧制模型。     

移动计算环境下的个人化服务发布和组装

随着移动计算技术的发展,移动设备用户可以服务的方式共享移动设备及其周围设备的计算能力和计算资源.然而,移动设备的私有性、资源受限性以及移动性等特征使得这种基于移动设备提供的个人化服务在发布和组装方面存在着一些特殊问题,例如用户隐私、移动设备资源消耗、网络环境变化引起的失效问题等.针对以上这些问题,提出一种移动计算环境下的个人化服务发布和组装方法.该方法在个人化服务发布过程中引入了服务意愿的概念,并在服务选择过程中综合考虑了服务意愿和服务效用.此外,还提出了资源感知的心跳机制来定期更新服务选择所依赖的设备及服务状态信息,从而解决由于网络环境变化等引起的服务失效问题.基于该方法,提出了一个基于JADE和OSGi的实现框架.通过一个案例分析,验证了所提出的实现框架的有效性以及在移动计算环境下考虑服务意愿的合理性.     

DaaS: Cloud-based mobile Web service discovery

The proliferation of smartphones and the recent advancement in ubiquitous wireless access have made mobile Web services more possible than ever before. However, finding relevant Web services that can match requests and fit user context remains a major concern. The challenges facing Web service discovery are further magnified by the stringent constraints of mobile devices and the inherit complexity of wireless heterogeneous networks. Cloud computing, with its flexible design and theoretically unlimited computing resources, is a viable approach to bootstrapping Web service discovery. The cloud can build bridges between mobile devices, as a convenient ubiquitous interface, and a backbone infrastructure with abundant computing resources. This paper introduces “Discovery as a service (Daas)”, a novel cloud-based discovery framework that addresses the core components of mobile Web service discovery. The DaaS framework lays the foundation of efficient mobile Web service discovery that takes into consideration user preferences and context. The experimental validation and performance evaluation demonstrate that DaaS can effectively rank relevant services according to the various user context and preferences, in addition to enhancing the precision of the discovered services. The prototype also shows that Web service clustering for discovery significantly improves the overall response time, while the cloud maintains scalability according to prespecified performance criteria.     

A testing framework for mobile computing software

We present a framework for testing applications for mobile computing devices. When a device is moved into and attached to a new network, the proper functioning of applications running on the device often depends on the resources and services provided locally in the current network. This framework provides an application-level emulator for mobile computing devices to solve this problem. Since the emulator is constructed as a mobile agent, it can carry applications across networks on behalf of its target device and allow the applications to connect to local servers in its current network in the same way as if they had been moved with and executed on the device itself. This paper also demonstrates the utility of this framework by describing the development of typical network-dependent applications in mobile and ubiquitous computing settings.     

Ubiquitous security for ubiquitous computing

The potential for rapid and diverse interconnectivity through devices utilising heterogeneous communications interfaces has enabled a truly ubiquitous computing environment. However, this has resulted in equally ubiquitous security risks due principally to the number and complexity of services being run over such networks. As technology advances towards the realisation of a ubiquitous computing environment, what impact does this have on the traditional information security triangle, of preserving the confidentiality, integrity and availability of information? And how does this influence, future information security requirements, particularly in light of always-on business processes which require real-time information sharing? This paper describes research conducted into answering these questions. Emphasis is placed on the need for risk management, and how this may be achieved through context-based access control mechanisms and pro-active threat assessment techniques.     

Access control management for ubiquitous computing

The purpose of ubiquitous computing is anywhere and anytime access to information within computing infrastructures that is blended into a background and no longer be reminded. This ubiquitous computing poses new security challenges while the information can be accessed at anywhere and anytime because it may be applied by criminal users. Additionally, the information may contain private information that cannot be shared by all user communities. Several approaches are developed to protect information for pervasive environments against malicious users. However, ad hoc mechanisms or protocols are typically added in the approaches by compromising disorganized policies or additional components to protect from unauthorized access.In this paper, we present a usage control model to protect services and devices in ubiquitous computing environments, which allows the access restrictions directly on services and object documents. The model not only supports complex constraints for pervasive computing, such as services, devices and data types but also provides a mechanism to build rich reuse relationships between models and objects. Finally, comparisons with related works are analysed.     

SUTIL – Network selection based on utility function and integer linear programming

This work presents SUTIL, a mechanism for network selection in the context of next generation networks (NGN). SUTIL selection mechanism prioritizes networks with higher relevance to the application and lower energy consumption and it enables full and seamless connectivity to mobile user devices and applications. Consequently, SUTIL contributes to realize the vision of ubiquitous computing, in which services, devices, and sensor-enriched environments interact anytime, anywhere to accomplish human designed tasks. The provided solution is based on utility function and integer linear programming and it aims at: (i) maximizing the user satisfaction while meeting application QoS and (ii) minimizing the energy consumption of devices when connecting to a target network. The solution is global since it considers for a given base station all devices that are simultaneously candidate for handoff. Simulation results showed the benefits of SUTIL usage in NGN environments.