Model-Driven Methodology for Rapid Deployment of Smart Spaces based on Resource-Oriented Architectures

Advances in electronics nowadays facilitate the design of smart spaces based on physical mash-ups of sensor and actuator devices. At the same time, software paradigms such as Internet of Things (IoT) and Web of Things (WoT) are motivating the creation of technology to support the development and deployment of web-enabled embedded sensor and actuator devices with two major objectives: (i) to integrate sensing and actuating functionalities into everyday objects, and (ii) to easily allow a diversity of devices to plug into the Internet. Currently, developers who are applying this Internet-oriented approach need to have solid understanding about specific platforms and web technologies. In order to alleviate this development process, this research proposes a Resource-Oriented and Ontology-Driven Development (ROOD) methodology based on the Model Driven Architecture (MDA). This methodology aims at enabling the development of smart spaces through a set of modeling tools and semantic technologies that support the definition of the smart space and the automatic generation of code at hardware level. ROOD feasibility is demonstrated by building an adaptive health monitoring service for a Smart Gym.

A Development Methodology to Facilitate the Integration of Smart Spaces into the Web of Things

How to create or integrate large Smart Spaces (considered as mash-ups of sensors and actuators) into the paradigm of ?Web of Things? has been the motivation of many recent works. A cutting-edge approach deals with developing and deploying web-enabled embedded devices with two major objectives: 1) to integrate sensor and actuator technologies into everyday objects, and 2) to allow a diversity of devices to plug to Internet. Currently, developers who want to use this Internet-oriented approach need have solid understanding about sensorial platforms and semantic technologies. In this paper we propose a Resource-Oriented and Ontology-Driven Development (ROOD) methodology, based on Model Driven Architecture (MDA), to facilitate to any developer the development and deployment of Smart Spaces. Early evaluations of the ROOD methodology have been successfully accomplished through a partial deployment of a Smart Hotel.

Smart Spaces and Smart Objects interoperability Architecture (S3OiA)

The presented work aims to contribute towards the standardization and the interoperability off the Future Internet through an open and scalable architecture design. We present S³OiA as a syntactic/semantic Service-Oriented Architecture that allows the integration of any type of object or device, not mattering their nature, on the Internet of Things. Moreover, the architecture makes possible the use of underlying heterogeneous resources as a substrate for the automatic composition of complex applications through a semantic Triple Space paradigm. Created applications are dynamic and adaptive since they are able to evolve depending on the context where they are executed. The validation scenario of this architecture encompasses areas which are prone to involve human beings in order to promote personal autonomy, such as home-care automation environments and Ambient Assisted Living.

Intentions: a confident-based interaction design for smart spaces

The paradigm of ubiquitous computing has become a reference for the design of Smart Spaces. Current trends in Ambient Intelligence are increasingly related to the scope of Internet of Things. This paradigm has the potential to support cost-effective solutions in the fields of telecare, e-health and Ambient Assisted Living. Nevertheless, ubiquitous computing does not provide end users with a role for proactive interactions with the environment. Thus, the deployment of smart health care services at a private space like the home is still unsolved. This PhD dissertation aims to define a person-environment interaction model to foster acceptability and users confidence in private spaces by applying the concept of user-centred security and the human performance model of seven stages of action.

Towards a lightweight mobile semantic-based approach for enhancing interaction with smart objects

This work describes a semantic extension for a user-smart object interaction model based on the ECA paradigm (Event-Condition-Action). In this approach, smart objects publish their sensing (event) and action capabilities in the cloud and mobile devices are prepared to retrieve them and act as mediators to configure personalized behaviours for the objects. In this paper, the information handled by this interaction system has been shaped according several semantic models that, together with the integration of an embedded ontological and rule-based reasoner, are exploited in order to (i) automatically detect incompatible ECA rules configurations and to (ii) support complex ECA rules definitions and execution. This semantic extension may significantly improve the management of smart spaces populated with numerous smart objects from mobile personal devices, as it facilitates the configuration of coherent ECA rules.

Mobile Indoor Augmented Reality. Exploring applications in hospitality environments.

Augmented reality (AR) is been increasingly used in mobile devices. Most of the available applications are set to work outdoors, mainly due to the availability of a reliable positioning system. Nevertheless, indoor (smart) spaces offer a lot of opportunities of creating new service concepts. In particular, in this paper we explore the applicability of mobile AR to hospitality environments (hotels and similar establishments). From the state-of-the-art of technologies and applications, a portfolio of services has been identified and a prototype using off-the-shelf technologies has been designed. Our objective is to identify the next technological challenges to overcome in order to have suitable underlying infrastructures and innovative services which enhance the traveller?s experience.

An attitude-based reasoning strategy to enhance interaction with augmented objects

This paper describes a mobile-based system to interact with objects in smart spaces, where the offer of resources may be extensive. The underlying idea is to use the augmentation capabilities of the mobile device to enable it as user-object mediator. In particular, the paper details how to build an attitude-based reasoning strategy that facilitates user-object interaction and resource filtering. The strategy prioritizes the available resources depending on the spatial history of the user, his real-time location and orientation and, finally, his active touch and focus interactions with the virtual overlay. The proposed reasoning method has been partially validated through a prototype that handles 2D and 3D visualization interfaces. This framework makes possible to develop in practice the IoT paradigm, augmenting the objects without physically modifying them.

Integration of wearable devices in a wireless sensor network for an e-health application

Applications based on Wireless Sensor Networks for Internet of Things scenarios are on the rise. The multiple possibilities they offer have spread towards previously hard to imagine fields, like e-health or human physiological monitoring. An application has been developed for its usage in scenarios where data collection is applied to smart spaces, aiming at its usage in fire fighting and sports. This application has been tested in a gymnasium with real, non-simulated nodes and devices. A Graphic User Interface has been implemented to suggest a series of exercises to improve a sportsman/woman s condition, depending on the context and their profile. This system can be adapted to a wide variety of e-health applications with minimum changes, and the user will interact using different devices, like smart phones, smart watches and/or tablets.

Confidence: dependencies and their critical role in fostering user acceptance in pervasive applications

Pervasive computing offers new scenarios where users are surrounded by invisible and proactive technology making smart spaces. Although the utility and power of solutions developed using this computer paradigm are proved, there are unresolved problems that hinder their acceptance and inclusion in our private life. Users have problems understanding the operations of a pervasive computing solution, and therefore they should trust that the solution works properly and according to their expectations. Nevertheless, the concept of trust is already framed in a specific use within the ecosystem of applications that can populate a smart space. To take this concept of trust to the whole space, we propose to study and define the concept of confidence. In contrast to the concept of trust, confidence has deeper psychological implications.

NFC based remote control of services for interactive spaces

Ubiquitous computing (one person, many computers) is the third era in the history of computing. It follows the mainframe era (many people, one computer) and the PC era (one person, one computer). Ubiquitous computing empowers people to communicate with services by interacting with their surroundings. Most of these so called smart environments contain sensors sensing users’ actions and try to predict the users’ intentions and necessities based on sensor data. The main drawback of this approach is that the system might perform unexpected or unwanted actions, making the user feel out of control. In this master thesis we propose a different procedure based on Interactive Spaces: instead of predicting users’ intentions based on sensor data, the system reacts to users’ explicit predefined actions. To that end, we present REACHeS, a server platform which enables communication among services, resources and users located in the same environment. With REACHeS, a user controls services and resources by interacting with everyday life objects and using a mobile phone as a mediator between himself/herself, the system and the environment. REACHeS’ interfaces with a user are built upon NFC (Near Field Communication) technology. NFC tags are attached to objects in the environment. A tag stores commands that are sent to services when a user touches the tag with his/her NFC enabled device. The prototypes and usability tests presented in this thesis show the great potential of NFC to build such user interfaces.