Rapid prototyping of complete systems, the case study of a smart parking

International audienceThis paper details how LINC a coordination middle-ware, can fasten the development of prototypes that integrate several equipment. A case study of rapid prototyping is presented. It illustrates how a smart parking prototype has been built from several independent and autonomous equipment, coming from different vendors. This has been achieved by parallel development thanks to the resource based approach offered by LINC. This paper also describes how LINC helps building rich user interfaces quickly and easily. I. INTRODUCTION Embedded systems have been part of our daily life for decades. Most of the industrial or consumer products embed multiple processors, sensors and actuators. The next step is the opportunity to build new products, systems, and usages, combining together several of these products. In such innovative and quickly evolving context it is necessary to build prototypes to test, validate, and challenge new products usages or solutions. This paper considers prototypes including several equipment, possibly from different vendors. Such prototypes can be used to exhibit demonstrations in a trade fair, to convince investors of the viability of an idea or to verify the adequacy of the solutions for early adopters. To succeed in today's highly competitive market, a prototype should be more than a few items wired together with a command line interface. Targeted prototypes are real-life demonstrations of new products or technologies with a high end-user experience. Moreover, a prototype should be included in its targeted environment (e.g. a house, a building or a parking). The development of prototypes is vital during the validation stage of new products as they may help to

Ecological IVIS design : using EID to develop a novel in-vehicle information system

New in-vehicle information systems (IVIS) are emerging which purport to encourage more environment friendly or ‘green’ driving. Meanwhile, wider concerns about road safety and in-car distractions remain. The ‘Foot-LITE’ project is an effort to balance these issues, aimed at achieving safer and greener driving through real-time driving information, presented via an in-vehicle interface which facilitates the desired behaviours while avoiding negative consequences. One way of achieving this is to use ecological interface design (EID) techniques. This article presents part of the formative human-centred design process for developing the in-car display through a series of rapid prototyping studies comparing EID against conventional interface design principles. We focus primarily on the visual display, although some development of an ecological auditory display is also presented. The results of feedback from potential users as well as subject matter experts are discussed with respect to implications for future interface design in this field

Creating green space sustainability through low-budget and upcycling strategies

Frugality is a core notion of sustainability, and responsible resource management should be prioritized in urban planning and landscape architecture. Low-budget strategies as a deliberate means of creating valuable, attractive, well-used, sociable public spaces are recognized by some influential designers using the Light, cheap, quick methodology. Unused spaces, just like objects and waste, can be creatively changed, reinvented with little resource input through a circular solution of upcycling. Case study methodology was predominantly used in the inquiry with three new parks, built after the year 2004, in Faro, Portugal. The study examined how the success rate and the current state of these public green areas correlates with the amount of financial resources invested in each of the projects. The case studies show key aspects in the building of the three spaces including: urban context, management and community participation. The success rate of a place is established based on user activity observations, user counts and questionnairesconveyed amongst both experts and local residents. Results illustrate how low-budget strategies and limited use of funds and resources can be translated into a successful project of a public greenery. Comparative studies from Warsaw and Berlin further extend the discussion to the concept of upcycling as a sustainable solution for landscape architecture.Horizon 2020, European Cooperation in Science and Technology, COST Action RESTORE [CA16114

Public entities driven robotic innovation in urban areas

Cities present new challenges and needs to satisfy and improve lifestyle for their citizens under the concept “Smart City”. In order to achieve this goal in a global manner, new technologies are required as the robotic one. But Public entities unknown the possibilities offered by this technology to get solutions to their needs. In this paper the development of the Innovative Public Procurement instruments is explained, specifically the process PDTI (Public end Users Driven Technological Innovation) as a driving force of robotic research and development and offering a list of robotic urban challenges proposed by European cities that have participated in such a process. In the next phases of the procedure, this fact will provide novel robotic solutions addressed to public demand that are an example to be followed by other Smart Cities.Peer ReviewedPostprint (author's final draft

Make it so! Jean-Luc Picard, Bart Simpson and the design of e-public services

In this paper, we report on a project applying participatory design methods to include people who have experience of social exclusion (in one form or another) in designing possible technologies for e-(local)-government services. The work was part of a project for the Office of the Deputy Prime Minister in the UK, and was concerned with ‘access tokens’ that can provide personal identification for individuals accessing public services, based on technologies such as multi-functional smartcards, flash memory sticks, mobile phone SIMs or similar devices. In particular we report on our experience using the ‘pastiche scenarios’ technique recently developed by Mark Blythe. Our findings indicate that the technique can be effective and engaging in helping people to create realistic scenarios of future technology use and highlight some possible pitfalls to consider when using this technique.</p

Smart Parking System: SMS Payment System Module

Shopping complex is a place where a lot of people gather; shopping for clothing, basic necessities, or everyday used materials. In order for the management side to facilitate such huge crowd, it is also important to have an efficient system to control flows of shoppers' car in the parking area and also the payment system. Today, SMS is an extensively used service and almost everyone is able to use it. This has lead to an increasing number of applications using SMS as the interface to the user. Besides it has been used in other way to communicate with each other, SMS application also can be used to make our live easier. For example we can use SMS for paying parking or anything else. This thesis describes the implementation and experience with SMS payment system with focusing on using SMS application to pay for car-park fees. The main objective of this project is to test practical approach of the SMS application for the payment system at all steps

City of things : enabling resource provisioning in smart cities

In the last few years, traffic over wireless networks has been increasing exponentially due to the impact of IoT. IoT is transforming a wide range of services in different domains of urban life, such as environmental monitoring, home automation, and public transportation. The so-called smart city applications will introduce a set of stringent requirements, such as low latency and high mobility, since services must be allocated and instantiated on demand, simultaneously, close to multiple devices at different locations. Efficient resource provisioning functionalities are needed to address these demanding constraints introduced by smart city applications while minimizing resource costs and maximizing QoS. In this article, the CoT framework is presented, which provides not only data collection and analysis functionalities but also automated resource provisioning mechanisms for future smart city applications. CoT is deployed as a smart city test-bed in Antwerp, Belgium, which allows researchers and developers to easily set up and validate IoT experiments. A smart city use case of air quality monitoring through the deployment of air quality sensors in moving cars is presented showing the full applicability of the CoT framework for a flexible and scalable resource provisioning in the smart city ecosystem

Virtual Prototyping and Validation for Autonomous Assistive Mobility

Physical disability in humans is something that no one has control over. It is catastrophic for people to experience it, and sometimes hinders them from enjoying the essence of life. Though disability is something people have no control over, they do have control on how they can go forward and make life beautiful and meaningful. Wheelchairs have helped people with disabilities in mobility, allowing them to move around with the help of others or sometimes on their own. This research will focus on development of an autonomous assistive mobility robot to help the disabled using virtual prototyping tools for development and validation. The developed virtual model will also be developed in real world and validated to navigate autonomously. The virtual and real-world autonomous model developed will take a systems engineering approach. The key features of this system are mapping, localisation, and navigating towards a goal autonomously. The virtual model is validated in different virtual environments for its functionality. The real-world model is developed similar to its virtual counterpart and is tested and validated for its functionality. The local path planner implemented is analyzed quantitatively for both the real-world and virtual models. The differences in design and development are analyzed and identified. To conclude, the research has lead to the development of a virtual and real-world model of an autonomous wheelchair that has been tested and validated in both the environments