IoT and blockchain paradigms for EV charging system

In this research work, we apply the Internet of Things (IoT) paradigm with a decentralized blockchain approach to handle the electric vehicle (EV) charging process in shared spaces, such as condominiums. A mobile app handles the user authentication mechanism to initiate the EV charging process, where a set of sensors are used for measuring energy consumption, and based on a microcontroller, establish data communication with the mobile app. A blockchain handles financial transitions, and this approach can be replicated to other EV charging scenarios, such as public charging systems in a city, where the mobile device provides an authentication mechanism. A user interface was developed to visualize transactions, gather users’ preferences, and handle power charging limitations due to the usage of a shared infrastructure. The developed approach was tested in a shared space with three EVs using a charging infrastructure for a period of 3.5 months.info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersio

Crocs: Cross-Technology Clock Synchronization for WiFi and ZigBee

Clock synchronization is a key function in embedded wireless systems and networks. This issue is equally important and more challenging in IoT systems nowadays, which often include heterogeneous wireless devices that follow different wireless standards. Conventional solutions to this problem employ gateway-based indirect synchronization, which suffers low accuracy. This paper for the first time studies the problem of cross-technology clock synchronization. Our proposal called Crocs synchronizes WiFi and ZigBee devices by direct cross-technology communication. Crocs decouples the synchronization signal from the transmission of a timestamp. By incorporating a barker-code based beacon for time alignment and cross-technology transmission of timestamps, Crocs achieves robust and accurate synchronization among WiFi and ZigBee devices, with the synchronization error lower than 1 millisecond. We further make attempts to implement different cross-technology communication methods in Crocs and provide insight findings with regard to the achievable accuracy and expected overhead

A critical analysis of research potential, challenges and future directives in industrial wireless sensor networks

In recent years, Industrial Wireless Sensor Networks (IWSNs) have emerged as an important research theme with applications spanning a wide range of industries including automation, monitoring, process control, feedback systems and automotive. Wide scope of IWSNs applications ranging from small production units, large oil and gas industries to nuclear fission control, enables a fast-paced research in this field. Though IWSNs offer advantages of low cost, flexibility, scalability, self-healing, easy deployment and reformation, yet they pose certain limitations on available potential and introduce challenges on multiple fronts due to their susceptibility to highly complex and uncertain industrial environments. In this paper a detailed discussion on design objectives, challenges and solutions, for IWSNs, are presented. A careful evaluation of industrial systems, deadlines and possible hazards in industrial atmosphere are discussed. The paper also presents a thorough review of the existing standards and industrial protocols and gives a critical evaluation of potential of these standards and protocols along with a detailed discussion on available hardware platforms, specific industrial energy harvesting techniques and their capabilities. The paper lists main service providers for IWSNs solutions and gives insight of future trends and research gaps in the field of IWSNs

Comparison Of Apple\u27s Ios 5 And Android For Mobile Applications Development: A Developer\u27s Perspective

Body composition, or the proportion of fat, muscle, and bone of an individual\u27s body, is an important indication of health status. Numerous techniques can be used to assess body composition, producing varied results and measurements. For individuals with insufficient or excessive amounts of body fat, accurate assessment of body composition is crucial. Two commonly used techniques for measuring body composition are air displacement plethysmography (adp) and dual-energy x-ray absorptiometry (dxa). Past research has been conducted, comparing adp and dxa, but the results are inconsistent. The majority of past studies found that, when compared to dxa, adp underestimated body fat percentage, but a few studies found that adp overestimated body fat percentage. Additionally, majority of the past studies have focused on ideal weight, overweight, and obese adults, with little research on body composition of athletes. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to determine whether body fat percentages obtained by adp and dxa statistically differ from one another, specifically in a lean population. Ninety-three collegiate student athletes participating in Division I NCAA sports participated in the study. Subjects underwent a bod pod and dxa scan, measuring their body composition. Body fat measures were then analyzed using spss. Paired-sample t-tests were conducted, comparing body fat percentage estimates from adp and dxa. Box plots and bland-altman plots were also created to display data. Results shothat body fat percentages obtained by adp were significantly lower than body fat percentages obtained by dxa, with the difference being greater in leaner individuals. These results are consistent with the majority of past research, which states that adp underestimates body fat percentage when compared to dxa. Clinicians should consider this discrepancy between adp and dxa for deciding which equipment to use when making clinical decions regarding student athletes\u27 health or participation status

Instant Messaging for BlackBerry PlayBook

V práci je představena cílová platforma BlackBerry Tablet OS a její vývojové prostředky. Práce dokumentuje návrh a implementaci klienta komunikačního protokolu XMPP/Jabber. Implementace je provedena ve vývojovém prostředí Flash Builder 4.6, v jazyce Adobe ActionScript 3.0.This thesis introduces the target platform BlackBerry Tablet OS as well as its development tools. It documents design and implementation of a client for communicating protocol XMPP/Jabber named IM Client. The implementation is done in the development environment Flash Builder 4.6 in the programming language Adobe Actionscript 3.0.

Closing the gap between UNGPS and content regulation/moderation practices

Both human-based and automated decisions are shaped by national legislation, international regulations as well as on platforms community guidelines or Terms of Service, a set of private rules that control what is allowed and what is not allowed on digital platforms. Such restrictions of what may or may not be deemed acceptable content are taking place in a context of increasing “digital authoritarianism” in which global internet freedom has declined for eleven consecutive years . Moreover, content moderation practices are currently shaped by corporate interests, within increasingly concentrated markets that are influenced by the network effects of the digital economy . Although it is well recognised that the same rights that people have offline must also be protected online, there are increasing examples of legislation and companies” Terms of Service which are leading to restrictions on freedom of expression and other human rights . On the other hand, most of national regulations constitute fragmented regulatory attempts and do not touch upon several issues that could propel content moderation practices that could better respect human rights, such as design features or proceedings closer to responsive regulation models. In this paper we argue that, despite its limitations and its formal legal status, the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs) offer a good starting point to address some of these problems and encourage rules and procedures for moderating user-generated online content that put human rights at the very centre of those decisions. Indeed, UNGPs provide the foundations for the development of a responsive normative framework that is consistent across borders, addressing problems generated by fragmented regulatory attempts and of multinational corporations operating in diverse contexts. In an area where there are no easy or clear-cut solutions, UNGPs provide procedural safeguards to collectively address the problems generated in content moderation. Moreover, the normative framework provided by the UNGPs constitute the backbone against which to judge governments that are adopting deficient public policies or to address different issues in the absence of regulation. Lastly, UNGPs greatest innovation is the creation of an independent duty to respect human rights for powerful private actors such as social media platforms that in some cases accumulate more power and institutional capacities than a significant share of governments around the globe. Although previous literature has already adopted a human rights approach to content moderation, we here attempt to provide a closer look upon the specific role that UNGPs may play in addressing the challenges of what has been called the “hidden industry” of content moderation within “mostly submerged systems of technological governance” . In the first section, we briefly describe and analyse the features of UNGPs that we think make them an adequate normative framework to address the human rights challenges that arise in the context of regulating and moderating user-generated content in the online world. We argue that, despite the limitations of an experimental and polycentric approach, the UNGPs have supported some progress, especially when it comes to the recognition of human rights standards in the tech sector. In the second section, we provide the reader with a brief introduction to ways in which content regulatlion/moderation has negatively affected the human right to freedom of expression. The following section addresses the relationship between UNGPs and the duties or roles that each actor could play in addressing the isse: governments, corporations, civil society organizations and individuals. Finally, we end with some concluding remarks and future research questions

The design and implementation of a smartphone and Bluetooth-based criminal tracking system

This thesis describes the design and implementation of a real-time criminal tracking system. A criminal under tracking is asked to wear a low energy Bluetooth device and carry a smartphone. The Bluetooth device is secure on his body (e.g., hand or foot) and communicates with the smartphone, which communicates with a central server through cellular networks. The smartphone monitors the status of the Bluetooth device and reports to the server in real time when the status changes (e.g., connection lost or device being taken off). Moreover, it monitors the criminal\u27s movement and reports to the server whenever the criminal moves into an alert zone, a geographic region where the law enforcement wants the criminal\u27s movement to be tracked. Compared to the existing tracking approaches, our system has the following desired features. 1) Scalable. Instead of having a criminal to report its location all the time, the system allows one to configure where and when the criminal needs to be tracked, thus minimizing both mobile communication cost and server processing cost. 2) Low-cost. The system uses only off-shelf components (e.g., Bluetooth device and smartphone) which communicate through regular wireless networks. 3) Secure. The communication between a Bluetooth device and the corresponding smartphone is authenticated through One Time Password

Business Intelligence Solution for Company 1188

Cílem této diplomové práce je vytvoření Business Intelligence řešení pro společnost 1188. Na základě výsledného Business Intelligence řešení bude umožněno managementu společnosti vykonávat přesnější rozhodnutí, která se budou shodovat se strategií společnosti.This master thesis has been written as a final report in the master degree program of Information Management at the Brno University of Technology. The aim of this master thesis was creating Business Intelligence solution for company 1188. On the basis of BI solution, management will be able to make better and smarter decisions in connection with company strategy.

Robotic prototyping environment (Progress report)

Journal ArticlePrototyping is an important activity in engineering. Prototype development is a good test for checking the viability of a proposed system. Prototypes can also help in determining system parameters, ranges, or in designing better systems. The interaction between several modules (e.g., S/W, VLSI, CAD, CAM, Robotics, and Control) illustrates an interdisciplinary prototyping environment that includes radically different types of information, combined in a coordinated way. Developing an environment that enables optimal and flexible design of robot manipulators using reconfigurable links, joints, actuators, and sensors is an essential step for efficient robot design and prototyping. Such an environment should have the right "mix" of software and hardware components for designing the physical parts and the controllers, and for the algorithmic control of the robot modules (kinematics, inverse kinematics, dynamics, trajectory planning, analog control and digital computer control). Specifying object-based communications and catalog mechanisms between the software modules, controllers, physical parts, CAD designs, and actuator and sensor components is a necessary step in the prototyping activities. We propose a flexible prototyping environment for robot manipulators with the required sub-systems and interfaces between the different components of this environment