Software Engineering for Mobility: Yet Another Roadmap

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Software Engineering for Mobility Yet Another
Roadmap Gruia-Catalin Roman, Gian Pietro Picco,
Amy L. Murphy Presenter Somo Banerjee
"The future lies in designing and selling
computers that people don't realize are computers
at all Adam Osborne
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Major trends in Computing
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Evolution

• Computing
• --------------
• Personal Computing - PC
• Distributed Computing - LAN, WAN, Grid
• Web Computing - WWW
• Mobile Computing - PDAs, Cell Phones, SmartPhones
• Pervasive Computing - !!!

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Summarizing this Paper 1

• Mobile Computing
• --------------------------
• No fixed network structure
• Nodes may come and go
• Processes may move among nodes
• Programs may evolve and change structure

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Constants are now Variables

• Variable Properties
• ----------------------------------
• Location
• Environment
• Connectivity
• Bandwidth
• I/O devices
• Security Domain

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DREAM Environment

• Issues
• -----------
• Temporary (?) loss of network connectivity
• Ad-hoc Resource Discovery
• Scarce Resources
• Low Battery Power
• Slow CPU Speed
• Small amount of Memory
• Frequent and unannounced changes in the
  environment

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DREAMy Devices
Comparison of some mobile devices ----------------
----------------------------
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Requirements for Mobility

• Dynamic Reconfiguration
• Adaptivity
• Asynchronous Interaction
• Context-Awareness
• Lightweight Middleware

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Summarizing this Paper - 2

• Critical Dimensions
• ----------------------------
• Space
• Coordination

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Summarizing this Paper - 3

• Space
• -------
• Physical Mobility
• Logical Mobility

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Summarizing this Paper - 4

• Coordination
• ------------------
• Resource Discovery
• (Extent of) Knowledge about a Resource
• Synchronization
• Exchange of Information/Data/Code

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Summarizing this Paper - 5

• Software Engineering
• -------------------------------
• Models
• Algorithms

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Summarizing this Paper - 6

• Models
• ----------
• Unit of mobility
• Location
• Context
• Coordination Mechanism

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Summarizing this Paper - 7

• Algorithms
• ----------------
• Control and manage location information of self
  and
• neighbors
• Spatial knowledge
• Mobile component interaction and communication
• Connectivity
• Power Efficiency

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Summarizing this Paper - 8

• Systems Research
• ----------------------
• Applications
• Middleware

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Summarizing this Paper - 9
Applications ---------------
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Styles of Interaction

• Nomadic interaction
• Ad-hoc interaction
• Presence (Find me) interaction

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Summarizing this Paper 10

• Middleware
• ---------------
• Logical Mobility is a design tool
• Physical Mobility is a requirement

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A Simple(?) Mobile Application

• Central DB e-Shopping Center
• PC Belongs to a pair of customers who are also
  married to each other
• PDAs One belonging to each of these two customers

E-Shopping System Snapshot
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Middleware for Mobile Computing

• Transparency or Awareness?
• -----------------------------------
• Replication
• Context
• Location

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Replication

• How to Replicate?
• When to Replicate?
• How much to Replicate?

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Context

• Conflict Management
• Commit Protocol
• Knowledge about Environment

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Location

• Where?
• When?
• Whom?

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Mobile Middleware Technologies - 1

• Reflective
• -- OpenCorba, Open-ORB, DynamicTAO, XMIDDLE
• Tuple Space
• -- LIME, TSpaces, JavaSpaces
• Context-Aware
• -- Nexus
• Event-Based
• -- Hermes

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Mobile Middleware Technologies - 2
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Some Viewpoints - 1

• By 2005, the typical cell phone will be
  indistinguishable from a PDA, and at least one
  U.S. carrier will support both 802.11 and 2.5G or
  3G on the same devices.
• As an unexpected consequence of this dual-band
  support, we'll see some instances of bottom-up
  networks, where devices connect directly with
  each other on a peer-to-peer basis. This will be
  a viable alternative to the current monopoly of
  carriers' antennas.
• -- John Jordan, principal, office of the chief
  technologist, Cap Gemini Ernst Young U.S. LLC,
  Cambridge, Mass.
• "Can I get it with side-by-side doors, an ice
  dispenser and a GSM connection in harvest gold?"
• There's always been a lot of talk about
  networking home appliances, but little action due
  to the difficulties of pulling wire or making
  networking run over power lines. But inexpensive
  networking running over public cellular networks
  will finally make possible next-generation
  applications, like a refrigerator that hosts a
  Web site listing what groceries a family needs
  and accepts bids from the local stores that want
  their business.
• And, of course, a screen on a refrigerator
  represents an amazing advertising opportunity for
  Duncan Hines, Kraft and every other food company.
  Retailer Fry's Electronics already has a
  refrigerator with an RJ45 jack installed.
  Cellular is just around the corner.
• -- Sheldon Laube, chairman, CenterBeam Inc.,
  Santa Clara, Calif.

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Some Viewpoints - 2

• As more and more nonvocal transactions are
  performed on our mobile phones, these devices
  will become the holder of our identities within
  the next five years. Much like the role of a
  driver's license, our mobile communications
  device will serve to authenticate individuals and
  securely contain credentials and certificates.
  Biometrics, embedded appropriately, would thwart
  identity theft. -- Peter Athanas, associate
  professor, Department of Electrical and Computer
  Engineering, Virginia Polytechnic Institute and
  State University, Blacksburg, Va.
• Within the next five years, all front-end user
  interfaces for computing will be wireless. --
  Sumit Deshpande and Don LeClair, technology
  strategists, Computer Associates International
  Inc., Islandia, N.Y.
• By 2005, mobile access to information will seem
  as natural as remote control of a TV. In fact,
  we'll wonder why we spent so much time at a desk.
  -- Jacob Christfort, chief technology officer for
  the Mobile Products and Services Division, Oracle
  Corp.

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Virus!!!

• June 23, 2004  
• Mobile Computing Security Through Obscurity
• Last week, Kaspersky Labs announced the discovery
  of the first virus to infect mobile phones. The
  virus, which Kaspersky named Cabir, affects
  mobile phones that use the Symbian OS. The virus
  is relatively harmless--its only purpose is to
  propagate itself, and it does so only to other
  phones that have Bluetooth enabled and are
  broadcasting their presence. However, Denis
  Zenkin, head of Corporate Communications at
  Kaspersky Labs, said that sooner or later, more
  malicious forms of mobile phone malware that will
  possibly destroy or steal data will begin to
  spread.
• http//www.windowsitpro.com/Article/ArticleID/430
  71/43071.html

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Virus!!!

• BRADOR TROJAN (WINDOWS CE)
• MOSQUIT TROJAN (SYMBIAN)
• NETSEC Security Brief October 2004 titled Mobile
  Computing Security Threats

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So! The Other Side

• Security
• Trust
• Privacy

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Before you go

• Four probable areas of research
• ------------------------------------
• Reconfigurable Systems
• Context Modeling
• Security-Trust-Privacy
• Efficient Wireless Connectivity

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About the Paper - Positives

• Nice analysis of Mobility in comparison with
  Distributed Systems
• Critical Dimensions recognized
• Theory Issues well-treated

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About the Paper - Negatives

• Verbose
• Security and Resource Constraint are not treated
  as first-class concerns
• Does not categorically mention areas where
  research needs to be done, rather leaves them as
  suggestions