A Java-based Mobile Agent Framework for Distributed Network Applications

Recently, a new paradigm has emerged forstructuring and developing distributed network applications inopen distributed and heterogeneous environments. Manyapplication areas, such as electronic commerce, mobilecomputing, network management and information retrieval canbenefit from the application of the Mobile Agent technology. Theexploitation of Mobile Agents offers several peculiar advantages,such as reduction of network latency, asynchronous execution,robust and fault tolerant behavior. Java technology provides aplatform-independent, portable software environment whichmakes it an excellent tool for mobile agent development. MobileAgents are mainly intended to be used for applicationsdistributed over large scale (slow) networks because they allowsaving communication costs by moving computation to the hoston which the target data resides. However, it has not becomepopular due to some problems such as security. In this paper, wepresent a distributed network architecture based on the MobileAgent approach. A network of communicating servers each ofwhich support multiple clients is our goal. We also propose asecurity approach for mobile agents, which protect critical dataof mobile agents from malicious attacks, by using cryptographictechniques. We implement a bank service application to be testedon our mobile agent framework. The results suggest that fornetworks with high latency, Mobile Agents may provideimprovements over more conventional client-server systems

Distributed Object Medical Imaging Model

Abstract- Digital medical informatics and images are commonly used in hospitals today,. Because of the interrelatedness of the radiology department and other departments, especially the intensive care unit and emergency department, the transmission and sharing of medical images has become a critical issue. Our research group has developed a Java-based Distributed Object Medical Imaging Model(DOMIM) to facilitate the rapid development and deployment of medical imaging applications in a distributed environment that can be shared and used by related departments and mobile physiciansDOMIM is a unique suite of multimedia telemedicine applications developed for the use by medical related organizations. The applications support realtime patients’ data, image files, audio and video diagnosis annotation exchanges. The DOMIM enables joint collaboration between radiologists and physicians while they are at distant geographical locations. The DOMIM environment consists of heterogeneous, autonomous, and legacy resources. The Common Object Request Broker Architecture (CORBA), Java Database Connectivity (JDBC), and Java language provide the capability to combine the DOMIM resources into an integrated, interoperable, and scalable system. The underneath technology, including IDL ORB, Event Service, IIOP JDBC/ODBC, legacy system wrapping and Java implementation are explored. This paper explores a distributed collaborative CORBA/JDBC based framework that will enhance medical information management requirements and development. It encompasses a new paradigm for the delivery of health services that requires process reengineering, cultural changes, as well as organizational changes

Java Bluetooth Wireless Technology for Evaluating Student Performance in Classroom

This paper focuses on the use of Java Bluetooth wireless technology for evaluation of student performance in classroom. First, an introduction to Bluetooth wireless technology is given. Second, use of Java technology for developing wireless applications is explored. Third, a framework is given for identifying the processes involved in education that can make use of mobile technology. Finally, a case study is presented on wireless classroom application for student evaluation

X-Klaim and Klava: Programming Mobile Code

AbstractHighly distributed networks have now become a common infrastructure for a new kind of wide-area distributed applications whose key design principle is network awareness, namely the ability to deal with dynamic changes of the network environment. Network-aware computing has called for new programming languages that exploit the mobility paradigm as the basic interaction mechanism. In this paper we present the Klaim (Kernel Language for Agent Interaction and Mobility) framework for programming mobile code applications, namely the X Klaim programming language and the Java-based run-time system Klava. In particular, we illustrate how Klava handles mobile code. Finally, an example is shown that is implemented using this framework

A Framework for Measuring the Usability Issues and Criteria of Mobile Learning Applications

With the continuing growth of mobile devices outpacing that of desktops and laptops, mobile devices have become the new personal computer. These devices have become increasingly sophisticated and extremely powerful in the last few years. Substantial work has been done to measure mobile applications’ level of quality; many researchers have attempted to figure out why certain applications fail and others succeed. In this thesis, a conceptual framework for measuring the quality aspects and criteria of m-learning is produced. Furthermore, a software prototype application for smartphones to assess usability issues of m-learning applications has been designed and implemented. This prototype application is developed using Java language and the Android Software development Kit, such that the recommended guidelines of the proposed framework are maintained. A questionnaire survey was conducted at Western University with approximately 96 undergraduate software engineering students. Five identical smartphones are used to evaluate the developed prototype in terms of ease of use, user satisfaction, attractiveness and learnability

Secure web services on mobile platform

Java ME framework supports running of applications on mobile and embedded devices like mobile phones. It contains small subset of Java API functions what consequently means limited application functionality. Open-source libraries for calling web services can be utilised in Java ME framework to increase application functionality. The library for support of secure web service calls does not exist yet. The thesis undertakes the development of the Parkiranje application which utilises WS-security protocol for secure handling of web services in Java ME framework. The application Parkiranje is a MIDlet and is based on Java ME framework. The thesis presents the application of WS-Security protocol in Java ME framework and the technologies used for programming of Parkiranje application. The thesis also demonstrates the Parkiranje application in a practical part. Street parking in big cities can be a tricky and time consuming exercise. There is an opportunity to use a mobile phone to speed up and simplify the search of parking space and to facilitate the payment transaction. In the thesis we have developed and implemented Parkiranje application, which will help the driver to find the closest free parking spot, facilitate parking spot reservation and payment transaction

Secure web services on mobile platform

Java ME framework supports running of applications on mobile and embedded devices like mobile phones. It contains small subset of Java API functions what consequently means limited application functionality. Open-source libraries for calling web services can be utilised in Java ME framework to increase application functionality. The library for support of secure web service calls does not exist yet. The thesis undertakes the development of the Parkiranje application which utilises WS-security protocol for secure handling of web services in Java ME framework. The application Parkiranje is a MIDlet and is based on Java ME framework. The thesis presents the application of WS-Security protocol in Java ME framework and the technologies used for programming of Parkiranje application. The thesis also demonstrates the Parkiranje application in a practical part. Street parking in big cities can be a tricky and time consuming exercise. There is an opportunity to use a mobile phone to speed up and simplify the search of parking space and to facilitate the payment transaction. In the thesis we have developed and implemented Parkiranje application, which will help the driver to find the closest free parking spot, facilitate parking spot reservation and payment transaction

Supporting Mobile Application Developer through Java IDE Using Contextual Inquiry

Mobile Devices are becoming popular more and more with millions of users acquiring them every day. For instance, in china, there are more than 400 million mobile users and this number is increasing (Young, 2005). Also, the mobile device market in the United States is increasing at an annual rate of 22% (Chen et al, 2003). Devices such as mobile cellular phones, Personal Digital Assistants (PDAs), music players etc run Java software such as games and business enterprise applications (Young, 2005). New Prospects are emerging for applications that are running on these devices especially in this post-PC era (Weyert de Boer et al, 2006) where mobile devices are used often for personal use and as commercial tool. This means that application aimed at such devices need to be developed and improved to give way to the construction of new mobile world (Weyert de Boer et al, 2006). However, Integrated Development Environments (IDEs) – such as Eclipse, Visual Studio, NetBeans, Borland JBuilder Enterprise with MobiSet 3, Sun Microsystems' Sun ONE (Open Network Environment) Studio 4 Mobile Edition, Metrowerks CodeWarrior Wireless Studio 7, S5 Systems' jVise (based on IBM Eclipse technology), etc. are tools of choice for developing mobile applications and they are also instrumental in developing individual components for mobile applications (Soroka et al, 2006). With the exception of Visual Studio, these IDEs are all based on Java. Developing mobile applications using any of these development environments is a complex task (Soroka et al, 2006). However, one vision of Java mobile applications developers is to deliver robust and comprehensive applications for various mobile devices that one can easily carry, through using one of the IDEs mentioned above. The popularity of mobile applications and services are now such that this research feels it is time to look at how well mobile applications developers are supported through these existing development tools. This research uses Contextual Inquiry (CI) (Holtzblatt and Beyer, 1997) to investigate how mobile applications developers can be supported through Java IDEs in order to identify problems that are encountered when using Java IDEs to develop mobile applications. We also assess the utility of CI for extracting the design requirements for the IDEs. NetBeans IDE was considered as the ideal IDE to use for this research. This is because it is an open source IDE and it is considered as the most widely used Java IDE for developing mobile applications for mobile devices (Benson et al, 2004). Therefore, this research was interested in finding ways to improve the usability of Java Supporting Mobile Application Developer through Java IDE Using Contextual Inquiry IDEs for mobile applications development and to provide more support for Java mobile applications developers through the IDEs. The techniques of CI recommend observing activities as they occur in their natural context in order to be able to portray the process of the work as well as the discovery of the places where technology could be applied to defeat the observed difficulties (Cross and Warmack, 2000). This method was chosen because it would provide data about the detailed problems faced by Java mobile applications developers when using a Java IDE to develop mobile applications and it will also provide guidance on the design of the support framework (Jones and Marsden, 2005; Preece et al, 2007)

Building distributed heterogeneous smart phone Java applications an evaluation from a development perspective

The advances in mobile phone technology have enabled such devices to be programmed to run general-purpose applications using a special edition of the Java programming language. Java is designed to be a heterogeneous programming language targeting different platforms. Such ability when coupled with the provision of high-speed mobile Internet access would open the door for a new breed of distributed mobile applications. This paper explores the capabilities and limitations of this technology and addresses the considerations that must be taken when designing and developing such distributed applications. Our findings are verified by building a test client-server system where the clients in this system are mobile phones behaving as active processing elements not just mere service requesters