Experimentation with MANETs of Smartphones

Mobile AdHoc NETworks (MANETs) have been identified as a key emerging technology for scenarios in which IEEE 802.11 or cellular communications are either infeasible, inefficient, or cost-ineffective. Smartphones are the most adequate network nodes in many of these scenarios, but it is not straightforward to build a network with them. We extensively survey existing possibilities to build applications on top of ad-hoc smartphone networks for experimentation purposes, and introduce a taxonomy to classify them. We present AdHocDroid, an Android package that creates an IP-level MANET of (rooted) Android smartphones, and make it publicly available to the community. AdHocDroid supports standard TCP/IP applications, providing real smartphone IEEE 802.11 MANET and the capability to easily change the routing protocol. We tested our framework on several smartphones and a laptop. We validate the MANET running off-the-shelf applications, and reporting on experimental performance evaluation, including network metrics and battery discharge rate.Comment: 6 pages, 7 figures, 1 tabl

Network Awareness for Wireless Peer-to-Peer Collaborative Environments

Presentation to the 37th Hawaii International Conference on System Science. Hilton Waikoloa Village, Island of Hawaii, 5-8 January 2004.The implications of using mobile wireless communications are significant for emerging peer-to-peer (P2P) collaborative environments. From a networking perspective, the use of wireless technologies to support collaboration may impact bandwidth and spectrum utilization. This paper explores the effects of providing feedback to system users regarding wireless P2P network behavior on the performance of collaboration support applications. We refer to this operational feedback as "network awareness." The underlying premise is that providing feedback on the status of the network will enable users to self-organize their behavior to maintain quality of data sharing. Results achieved during an experiment conducted at the Naval Postgraduate School demonstrate significant effects of roaming on application sharing performance and integration with client-server applications. A solution for improving network aware P2P collaboration, identified in the experiment, is discussed

Enabling Disaster Relief Supply Chain Visibility (SCV) and Supply Chain Coordination (SCC)

In disaster relief–humanitarian logistics (DRHL), supply chain visibility (SCV) and supply chain coordination (SCC) remain crucial to supply chain performance, when demand and lead times are volatile. Many DRHL solutions based on operations research or other such models in the literature, rely on SCV and SCC. However, there is a paucity of literature on how to enable SCV and SCC immediately after disasters strike. This paper proposes decentralised, peer–to–peer (P2P) systems architecture (SA) that augments existing information systems and communications networks in use. This architecture has additional capabilities that enable a ‘low cost version’ of SCV and SCC. By identifying antecedents and characteristics of agile and quick response supply chain and introducing them into DRHL, we lay the framework for enabling SCV and SCC in DRHL. Based on this completed research on the systems architecture and framework, this paper outlines briefly, an implementable version of an artefact for such deployment

A Methodology for Engineering Collaborative and ad-hoc Mobile Applications using SyD Middleware

Today’s web applications are more collaborative and utilize standard and ubiquitous Internet protocols. We have earlier developed System on Mobile Devices (SyD) middleware to rapidly develop and deploy collaborative applications over heterogeneous and possibly mobile devices hosting web objects. In this paper, we present the software engineering methodology for developing SyD-enabled web applications and illustrate it through a case study on two representative applications: (i) a calendar of meeting application, which is a collaborative application and (ii) a travel application which is an ad-hoc collaborative application. SyD-enabled web objects allow us to create a collaborative application rapidly with limited coding effort. In this case study, the modular software architecture allowed us to hide the inherent heterogeneity among devices, data stores, and networks by presenting a uniform and persistent object view of mobile objects interacting through XML/SOAP requests and responses. The performance results we obtained show that the application scales well as we increase the group size and adapts well within the constraints of mobile devices

Current challenges and future trends in the field of communication architectures for microgrids

[EN] The concept of microgrid has emerged as a feasible answer to cope with the increasing number of distributed renewable energy sources which are being introduced into the electrical grid. The microgrid communication network should guarantee a complete and bidirectional connectivity among the microgrid resources, a high reliability and a feasible interoperability. This is in a contrast to the current electrical grid structure which is characterized by the lack of connectivity, being a centralized-unidirectional system. In this paper a review of the microgrids information and communication technologies (ICT) is shown. In addition, a guideline for the transition from the current communication systems to the future generation of microgrid communications is provided. This paper contains a systematic review of the most suitable communication network topologies, technologies and protocols for smart microgrids. It is concluded that a new generation of peer-to-peer communication systems is required towards a dynamic smart microgrid. Potential future research about communications of the next microgrid generation is also identified.This work is supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO) and the European Regional Development Fund (ERDF) under Grant ENE2015-64087-C2-2. This work is supported by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MINECO) under grant BES-2013-064539.Marzal-Romeu, S.; Salas-Puente, RA.; González Medina, R.; Garcerá, G.; Figueres Amorós, E. (2018). Current challenges and future trends in the field of communication architectures for microgrids. Renewable and Sustainable Energy Reviews. 82(2):3610-3622. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rser.2017.10.101S3610362282