ConXsense - Automated Context Classification for Context-Aware Access Control

We present ConXsense, the first framework for context-aware access control on mobile devices based on context classification. Previous context-aware access control systems often require users to laboriously specify detailed policies or they rely on pre-defined policies not adequately reflecting the true preferences of users. We present the design and implementation of a context-aware framework that uses a probabilistic approach to overcome these deficiencies. The framework utilizes context sensing and machine learning to automatically classify contexts according to their security and privacy-related properties. We apply the framework to two important smartphone-related use cases: protection against device misuse using a dynamic device lock and protection against sensory malware. We ground our analysis on a sociological survey examining the perceptions and concerns of users related to contextual smartphone security and analyze the effectiveness of our approach with real-world context data. We also demonstrate the integration of our framework with the FlaskDroid architecture for fine-grained access control enforcement on the Android platform.Comment: Recipient of the Best Paper Awar

Conceptual evidence collection and analysis methodology for Android devices

Android devices continue to grow in popularity and capability meaning the need for a forensically sound evidence collection methodology for these devices also increases. This chapter proposes a methodology for evidence collection and analysis for Android devices that is, as far as practical, device agnostic. Android devices may contain a significant amount of evidential data that could be essential to a forensic practitioner in their investigations. However, the retrieval of this data requires that the practitioner understand and utilize techniques to analyze information collected from the device. The major contribution of this research is an in-depth evidence collection and analysis methodology for forensic practitioners.Comment: in Cloud Security Ecosystem (Syngress, an Imprint of Elsevier), 201

Toward Customizable Multi-tenant SaaS Applications

abstract: Nowadays, Computing is so pervasive that it has become indeed the 5th utility (after water, electricity, gas, telephony) as Leonard Kleinrock once envisioned. Evolved from utility computing, cloud computing has emerged as a computing infrastructure that enables rapid delivery of computing resources as a utility in a dynamically scalable, virtualized manner. However, the current industrial cloud computing implementations promote segregation among different cloud providers, which leads to user lockdown because of prohibitive migration cost. On the other hand, Service-Orented Computing (SOC) including service-oriented architecture (SOA) and Web Services (WS) promote standardization and openness with its enabling standards and communication protocols. This thesis proposes a Service-Oriented Cloud Computing Architecture by combining the best attributes of the two paradigms to promote an open, interoperable environment for cloud computing development. Mutil-tenancy SaaS applicantions built on top of SOCCA have more flexibility and are not locked down by a certain platform. Tenants residing on a multi-tenant application appear to be the sole owner of the application and not aware of the existence of others. A multi-tenant SaaS application accommodates each tenant’s unique requirements by allowing tenant-level customization. A complex SaaS application that supports hundreds, even thousands of tenants could have hundreds of customization points with each of them providing multiple options, and this could result in a huge number of ways to customize the application. This dissertation also proposes innovative customization approaches, which studies similar tenants’ customization choices and each individual users behaviors, then provides guided semi-automated customization process for the future tenants. A semi-automated customization process could enable tenants to quickly implement the customization that best suits their business needs.Dissertation/ThesisDoctoral Dissertation Computer Science 201

Closing the Gap Between Designers and Developers in a Low-Code Ecosystem

Digital systems play an important role in the strategy of companies nowadays as they are crucial to achieve their business goals as well as gain a competitive advantage. This is particularly true for systems designed for the end-users market. Not only has the number of such systems been growing steadily but the requirements and expectations of users regarding usability and performance have also increased. Developing software systems is a complex process that comprises several stages and involves multiple professionals responsible for different tasks. Two stages of the process are the design and implementation of User Interfaces. UX and UI designers produce artifacts such as mockups and prototypes using design tools describing what should be the systems behavior, interactivity and look and feel. Next, Front-end and Back-end developers implement the system according to the specifications defined by designers. Designers and developers use different methodologies, languages, and tools. This introduces a communication gap between both groups, and hence collaboration between them is not always smooth. This ends up causing less efficient processes, rework and loss of information. Developers sometimes overlook the importance of User Experience and Front-end De velopment. The corresponding project stages suffer when collaboration between groups is not optimal. Problems are particularly striking during the transition from design arti facts to front-end code. The procedures for doing this are often manual, very error-prone, and time-consuming for developers that end-up completely re-doing the designers’ work in the target web technology. The aim of this dissertation is to improve the efficiency of collaboration between de signers and front-end developers in the OutSystems ecosystem. This was carried out by developing a tool that transforms UX/UI design artefacts into low-code web-technology using model transformation and meta-modelling techniques. The approach has been evaluated in practice by a team of professional designers and front-end developers. Re sults show savings between 20 and 75% according to the project complexity in the effort invested by development teams in the above mentioned process.Os sistemas digitais têm um papel muito importante hoje em dia na estratégia das empresas, uma vez que as ajudam a atingir os seus objetivos de negócios assim como a ganhar vantagem competitiva face às demais. Isto é particularmente verdade para os sistemas destinados ao mercado dos utilizadores finais. Não só aumentou significativamente o número de tais sistemas como aumentaram também os requisitos e expectativas dos seus utilizadores. O desenvolvimento de sistemas de software é um processo complexo que envolve um número alargado de profissionais com diferentes perfis. Duas das fases são o design de interfaces e a sua implementação. Os UI e UX designers produzem um conjunto de ficheiros utilizando ferramentas de design descrevendo o comportamento, interação e aparência do sistema. Os Front-end e Back-end developers implementam as funcionalidades do sistema com base nas especificações dos designers. Designers e developers trabalham utilizando diferentes metodologias, linguagens e ferramentas. Isto introduz uma lacuna entre os grupos e dificulta a sua colaboração, originando processos menos eficientes, trabalho refeito e perda de informação. Os engenheiros de software por vezes negligenciam disciplinas tais como a Experi ência do Utilizador e o Front-end. Estas fases dos projetos são prejudicadas quando a colaboração entre os grupos não é ótima. Os problemas são particularmente evidentes durante a transição entre design e Front-end. Os procedimentos são manuais, altamente propensos a erros e demorados para os developers, que acabam por refazer o trabalho dos designers na tecnologia web desejada. O objetivo desta dissertação é melhorar a eficiência da colaboração entre designers e front-end developers no ecossistema OutSystems. Isto foi levado a cabo desenvolvendo uma ferramenta capaz de transformar artefactos de UX/UI em low-code utilizando transformações de modelos e técnicas de meta-modeling. A abordagem foi avaliada em prática por uma equipa profissional de designers e front-end developers. Os resultados obtidos mostram poupanças entre os 20 e os 75% de acordo com a complexidade do projeto no esforço investido pelas equipas de desenvolvimento no processo mencionado acima

The Effect of Incorporating End-User Customization into Additive Manufacturing Designs

In the realm of additive manufacturing there is an increasing trend among makers to create designs that allow for end-users to alter them prior to printing an artifact. Online design repositories have tools that facilitate the creation of such artifacts. There are currently no rules for how to create a good customizable design or a way to measure the degree of customization within a design. This work defines three types of customizations found in additive manufacturing and presents three metrics to measure the degree of customization within designs based on the three types of customization. The goal of this work is to ultimately provide a consistent basis for which a customizable design can be evaluated in order to assist makers in the creation of new customizable designs that can better serve end-user. The types of customization were defined by doing a search of Thingiverse’s online data base of customizable designs and evaluating commonalities between designs. The three types of customization defined by this work are surface, structure, and personal customization. The associated metrics are used to quantify the adjustability of a set of online designs which are then plot against the daily use rate and each other on separate graphs. The use rate data used in this study is naturally biased towards hobbyists due to where the designs used to create the data resides. A preliminary analysis is done on the metrics to evaluate their correlation with design use rate as well as the dependency of the metrics in relation to each other. The trends between the metrics are examined for an idea of how best to provide customizable designs. This work provides a basis for measuring the degree of customization within additive manufacturing design and provides an initial framework for evaluating the usability of designs based on the measured degree of customization relative to the three types of defined customizations

DESIGN PRINCIPLES FOR APP-BASED HEALTHCARE INTERVENTIONS: A MIXED METHOD APPROACH

Despite the ubiquity of mobile health applications (apps), the practical use and success of the apps have been questionable. Design Principles (DP) can affect chronic health app user satisfaction and have been studied for ensuring favorable app usage. However, there is no consensual definition of DP within the preceding literature, which has a technical rather than an end-user-centric focus and lacks a rigorous theoretical basis. Moreover, different levels of DPs’ application can lead to differential user satisfaction as influenced by the user-contextual environment, warranting a quantitative assessment. Accordingly, the overarching question to be addressed is which DP for the self-management of chronic conditions contributes to better user satisfaction outcomes. The research focuses on Multiple Sclerosis (MS) as a representative condition. This research uses a mixed methods, with a qualitative approach for DP identification and a quantitative approach for the studying the DP-Satisfaction relationship. The DP identification is achieved through - 1) An in depth review of foundational theory for greater validity, 2) A Systematic Literature Review (SLR), for DP themes grounded in theory, and 3) Manually coded user reviews for MS apps. The theoretical underpinnings of the empirical approach are established through a composite theoretical lens, based on technologically, behaviorally, and cognitively oriented frameworks. The DP extracted from theory, SLR, and manual coding methods are found to be largely consistent with each other, namely ‘Communication with Clinicians’, ‘Compatibility, ‘Education’, ‘Notifications’, ‘Tracking’, ‘Social Support’, ‘Ease of Use’, ‘Technical Support’, ‘Usefulness’, ‘Privacy and Security’, and Quality. An ordinal logistic regression analysis is conducted to understand the relationship between DP and User Satisfaction outcomes based on the manually coded DP scores of the user reviews. All DP have a significant impact on User Satisfaction. From a theoretical perspective, the research improves our understanding of key design principles for the self-management of chronic conditions such as MS and the impact of such principles on user satisfaction. From a practical perspective, the findings provide guidance to the user requirement elicitation process, potentially leading to the development of more successful, sustainable, and responsive healthcare interventions

Drivers and outcomes of branded mobile app usage intention

Purpose: This study examines the drivers and outcomes of the usage intention of branded mobile applications (apps), revealing findings of theoretical and practical relevance. First, it uncovers the specific technological features that underpin the perceived usefulness and ease of use of branded apps driving (directly and indirectly) usage intention. Second, it outlines two key outcomes that are relevant to the strategic management of branded apps: willingness to recommend the app and willingness to pay to continue using the app. Approach: This study uses data randomly derived from a panel of one million UK consumers, analyzed via structural equations modeling. The unit of analysis was individual apps prominently displaying a brand identity. The study tested indirect relationships between the key drivers considered and usage intention, via perceived usefulness and ease of use. Findings: Consumers who view branded apps as protecting their privacy, customizable and compatible with what they do, will have stronger perceptions of usefulness and ease of use, and greater intention to use the app. These effects also occur indirectly. Furthermore, usage intention drives the willingness to recommend the app and to pay to continue using it. Practical implications: To influence usage intention, managers can improve the perception of usefulness of branded apps by protecting consumer privacy, and improving the app’s design and its compatibility with people’s needs and lifestyle. Managers can also enhance the perception of ease of use of the branded app by heightening its security and ubiquity. Combined, these factors can enhance (directly and indirectly) the intention to use the app, which will lead to the willingness to recommend the app and pay for it. Originality/value: This study extends previous research by examining factors driving the intention to use branded apps and the resulting outcomes. It also offers a model that yields predictions for individual branded apps (not the brand powering the app), thus providing practical recommendations on how to manage, in general, apps with a brand identity

CAN END-USERS PROGRAM?

In recent years, personal computing has changed direction and is now more inclined towards the world of mobile computing. This means that end-users expect a simpler and more personalized experience. To achieve the highest level of customization, end-users must develop their own applications. However, end-users usually lack in having the right skills for that task. To address this problem, many end-users programming languages and frameworks have been devised. These are particularly aimed at reducing syntax and cognitive gaps. However, some of the existing solutions reduced the expressiveness of the language and thus reduced the generality of the program, while others remains too complex for end-users. In this work we devise a new framework, named Dev4Me, designed from the ground up to provide end-users a solution for developing mobile and personal apps. The framework is made up of a new form-based language, an Integrated Development Environment (IDE) and an execution environment. The new framework enables the users to develop, test, debug and use their own apps in a few simple steps, using familiar form filling experience