Decentralization of multimedia content in a heterogeneous environment

The aim of this study has been the decentralization of multimedia content in a heterogeneous environment. The environment consisted of the research networks connecting the European Organization for Nuclear Research and the Finnish University and Research Network. The European Organization for Nuclear Research produces multimedia content which can be used as studying material all over the world. The Web University pilot in the European Organization for Nuclear Research has been developing a multimedia content delivery service for years. Delivering the multimedia content requires plenty of capacity from the network infrastructure. Different content of the material can have different demands for the network. In a heterogeneous environment, like the Internet, fulfilling all the demands can be a problem. Several methods exist to improve the situation. Decentralization of the content is one of the most popular solutions. Mirroring and caching are the main methods for decentralization. Recently developed content delivery networks are using both of these techniques to satisfy the demands of the content. The practical application consisted of measurements of the network connection between the multimedia server in the European Organization for Nuclear Research and the Finnish University and Research Network, planning and building a decentralization system for the multimedia content. After the measurements, it became clear that there is n o need for decentralization of the multimedia content for users that are able to utilise the Finnish University and Research Network. There could be double today's usage, and still there would be no problems with the capacity. However, the European Organization for Nuclear Research routes all traffic that comes from outside research networks through a gateway in the USA. This affects every connection that is made from Finland: users are not able to use the international connection offered by the Finnish University and Research Network. For these users I designed and built a simple, modular and portable decentralization system

Enhancing honeynet-based protection with network slicing for massive Pre-6G IoT Smart Cities deployments

Internet of Things (IoT) coupled with 5G and upcoming pre-6G networks will provide the scalability and performance required to deploy a wide range of new digital services in Smart Cities. This new digital services will undoubtedly contribute to an improvement in the quality of life of citizens. However, security is a major concern in IoT where low-powered constrained devices are a target for attackers who identify them as a vulnerable entry point to exploit the network weaknesses. This concern is exacerbated in Smart Cities where it is expected to deploy millions of heterogeneous yet unattended and vulnerable IoT devices throughout vast urban areas. A security breach in a Smart City allows attackers to target critical services such as the power grid network or the road traffic control or to expose sensitive health data to intruders. Thus, the security and privacy of citizens could be seriously compromised. Honeynets are an effective security mechanism to distract attackers from legitimate targets and collect valuable information on how they operate. Meanwhile, current honeynets lack functionality to protect the real and lure networks from large-scale volumetric Distributed Denial of Service (DDoS) attacks. This paper provides a novel solution to empower honeynet security tools with Network Slicing capabilities as an innovative way to isolate and minimize the network resources available from attackers. The proposed system supports the ambitious IoT scalability requirements associated to 5G networks and the forthcoming 6G networks. The solution has been empirically evaluated in a emulated testbed where promising results have been achieved when dealing with mMTC and eMBB traffic profiles. In mMTC scenarios where scalability is a challenge, the solution is able to deal with up to 1000 slices and 1 Million IoT devices sending traffic simultaneously. In eMBB use cases, the solution is able to cope with up to 19 Gbps of combined bandwidth. The gathered results demonstrate that the proposed solution is suitable as a security tool in 5G IoT multi-tenant infrastructures as those expected in Smart Cities deployments

Distributed aop middleware for large-scale scenarios

En aquesta tesi doctoral presentem una proposta de middleware distribuït pel desenvolupament d'aplicacions de gran escala. La nostra motivació principal és permetre que les responsabilitats distribuïdes d'aquestes aplicacions, com per exemple la replicació, puguin integrar-se de forma transparent i independent. El nostre enfoc es basa en la implementació d'aquestes responsabilitats mitjançant el paradigma d'aspectes distribuïts i es beneficia dels substrats de les xarxes peer-to-peer (P2P) i de la programació orientada a aspectes (AOP) per realitzar-ho de forma descentralitzada, desacoblada, eficient i transparent. La nostra arquitectura middleware es divideix en dues capes: un model de composició i una plataforma escalable de desplegament d'aspectes distribuïts. Per últim, es demostra la viabilitat i aplicabilitat del nostre model mitjançant la implementació i experimentació de prototipus en xarxes de gran escala reals.In this PhD dissertation we present a distributed middleware proposal for large-scale application development. Our main aim is to separate the distributed concerns of these applications, like replication, which can be integrated independently and transparently. Our approach is based on the implementation of these concerns using the paradigm of distributed aspects. In addition, our proposal benefits from the peer-to-peer (P2P) networks and aspect-oriented programming (AOP) substrates to provide these concerns in a decentralized, decoupled, efficient, and transparent way. Our middleware architecture is divided into two layers: a composition model and a scalable deployment platform for distributed aspects. Finally, we demonstrate the viability and applicability of our model via implementation and experimentation of prototypes in real large-scale networks

New data processing technologies at LHC: From Grid to Cloud Computing and beyond

Since a few years the LHC experiments at CERN are successfully using the Grid Computing Technologies for their distributed data processing activities, on a global scale. Recently, the experience gained with the current systems allowed the design of the future Computing Models, involving new technologies like Could Computing, virtualization and high performance distributed database access. In this paper we shall describe the new computational technologies of the LHC experiments at CERN, comparing them with the current models, in terms of features and performance

State of the art survey of network operating systems development

The results of the State-of-the-Art Survey of Network Operating Systems (NOS) performed for Goddard Space Flight Center are presented. NOS functional characteristics are presented in terms of user communication data migration, job migration, network control, and common functional categories. Products (current or future) as well as research and prototyping efforts are summarized. The NOS products which are revelant to the space station and its activities are evaluated

Do More Than Train New Nurses...Retain Them! A Qualitative Research Study

The purpose of this hermeneutic phenomenological study is to understand the orientation experiences of new graduate nurses and identify retention practices that are relevant and beneficial to the population of interest. Study participants were new graduate nurses employed at a five-hospital healthcare system. Using social constructivism as the theoretical framework, the study sought to answer the research question of what are the lived experiences of new graduate nurses during orientation? Ten new graduate nurses participated in individual interviews to discuss their personal orientation experiences. The interviews informed the researcher regarding the meaning and value new graduates place on their orientation experiences and what made them stay in their current position. Sessions were recorded, transcribed, and coded for themes. Findings of the research indicate that new graduate nurses continue to experience reality shock as they transition from student to professional nurse. During orientation, new graduate nurses desired tactile learning experiences to cement the knowledge attained in the didactic portions of their orientation. Additionally, they possessed a yen to work in a positive supportive unit culture. Nine of the ten nurses are still working on the nursing unit where they were hired to work as new graduate nurses. Future research regarding new graduate orientation and retention practices should focus on individuals who have vacated their first nursing position to evaluate how their orientation experiences may have differed from the study sample and if they have additional insight into effective retention practices

Development of a system compliant with the Application-Layer Traffic Optimization Protocol

Dissertação de mestrado integrado em Engenharia InformáticaWith the ever-increasing Internet usage that is following the start of the new decade, the need to optimize this world-scale network of computers becomes a big priority in the technological sphere that has the number of users rising, as are the Quality of Service (QoS) demands by applications in domains such as media streaming or virtual reality. In the face of rising traffic and stricter application demands, a better understand ing of how Internet Service Providers (ISPs) should manage their assets is needed. An important concern regards to how applications utilize the underlying network infras tructure over which they reside. Most of these applications act with little regard for ISP preferences, as exemplified by their lack of care in achieving traffic locality during their operation, which would be a preferable feature for network administrators, and that could also improve application performance. However, even a best-effort attempt by applications to cooperate will hardly succeed if ISP policies aren’t clearly commu nicated to them. Therefore, a system to bridge layer interests has much potential in helping achieve a mutually beneficial scenario. The main focus of this thesis is the Application-Layer Traffic Optimization (ALTO) work ing group, which was formed by the Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) to explore standardizations for network information retrieval. This group specified a request response protocol where authoritative entities provide resources containing network status information and administrative preferences. Sharing of infrastructural insight is done with the intent of enabling a cooperative environment, between the network overlay and underlay, during application operations, to obtain better infrastructural re sourcefulness and the consequential minimization of the associated operational costs. This work gives an overview of the historical network tussle between applications and service providers, presents the ALTO working group’s project as a solution, im plements an extended system built upon their ideas, and finally verifies the developed system’s efficiency, in a simulation, when compared to classical alternatives.Com o acrescido uso da Internet que acompanha o início da nova década, a necessidade de otimizar esta rede global de computadores passa a ser uma grande prioridade na esfera tecnológica que vê o seu número de utilizadores a aumentar, assim como a exigência, por parte das aplicações, de novos padrões de Qualidade de Serviço (QoS), como visto em domínios de transmissão de conteúdo multimédia em tempo real e em experiências de realidade virtual. Face ao aumento de tráfego e aos padrões de exigência aplicacional mais restritos, é necessário melhor compreender como os fornecedores de serviços Internet (ISPs) devem gerir os seus recursos. Um ponto fulcral é como aplicações utilizam os seus recursos da rede, onde muitas destas não têm consideração pelas preferências dos ISPs, como exemplificado pela sua falta de esforço em localizar tráfego, onde o contrário seria preferível por administradores de rede e teria potencial para melhorar o desempenho aplicacional. Uma tentativa de melhor esforço, por parte das aplicações, em resolver este problema, não será bem-sucedida se as preferências administrativas não forem claramente comunicadas. Portanto, um sistema que sirva de ponte de comunicação entre camadas pode potenciar um cenário mutuamente benéfico. O foco principal desta tese é o grupo de trabalho Application-Layer Traffic Optimization (ALTO), que foi formado pelo Internet Engineering Task Force (IETF) para explorar estandardizações para recolha de informação da rede. Este grupo especificou um protocolo onde entidades autoritárias disponibilizam recursos com informação de estado de rede, e preferências administrativas. A partilha de conhecimento infraestrutural é feita para possibilitar um ambiente cooperativo entre redes overlay e underlay, para uma mais eficiente utilização de recursos e a consequente minimização de custos operacionais. É pretendido dar uma visão da histórica disputa entre aplicações e ISPs, assim como apresentar o projeto do grupo de trabalho ALTO como solução, implementar e melhorar sobre as suas ideias, e finalmente verificar a eficiência do sistema numa simulação, quando comparado com alternativas clássicas

Contextproxy : a location-aware HTTP proxy server to support web based context-aware services and applications

Cataloged from PDF version of article.The pervasion of computing in our physical world promises more than the ubiquitous availability of computing resources; totally new and exciting interaction schemes are to be explored. Context-awareness, one of the most important aspects of ubiquitous computing, enables applications that make use of their users’ context to provide dynamically adapting information and services to their users or to other applications. Although the technological infrastructure to support ubiquitous and context-aware applications is being deployed rapidly, the standards and the best practices for the interactions of various components in a context-aware application are still missing. In our work we have developed a location-aware HTTP proxy server, called ContextProxy that runs on the popular Symbian platform. ContextProxy acts as a standard HTTP proxy server from the client application’s perspective but it augments the service request of the client with the available location information while submitting the request to the service provider. This allows the existing nomadic applications to immediately become locationaware if they can be configured to make use of a standard HTTP proxy which is a common scheme for web based applications. And also it is possible to write new nomadic applications without considering the context-awareness aspect at the service requestor level. The contextual information added by ContextProxy can then be utilized by the service provider to dynamically adapt its services according to the service requestor’s context.Uluçınar, Alper RifatM.S