Date of Award

4-2008

Degree Name

Doctor of Philosophy

Department

Computer Science

First Advisor

Dr. Ajay Gupta

Second Advisor

Dr. Ala Al-Fuqaha

Third Advisor

Dr. Leszek Lilien

Fourth Advisor

Dr. Ikhlas Abdel-Qader

Abstract

The increased number of embedded devices/systems in our environment and the evolution of the internet as a service oriented network connote two things: the demand for ubiquitous computing, and, the abstraction of users as consumers and applications as services, as in Service Oriented Computing (SOC) and Web Service domains.

This Thesis studies Class 2 Opportunistic Networks, Oppnets--in short. Oppnets propagate dynamic interconnection of heterogeneous devices/networks/systems and the integration of their resources or services-such as computation, communication, sensing, actuation, and storage -irrespective of the discrepancies in hardware, software, protocols, or standards employed, to enable ubiquitous computing. The novelty of Oppnets lies in itsability to grow into a larger network and leverage resources of the new heterogenous devices/networks/systems as though they were part of the initial network.

The first contribution of this research is the design and implementation of a small- scale Oppnet, called MicroOppnet, which not only acts as a proof-of-concept for Oppnets but can also be extended to be a testbed for experimentation and pilot implementation of Oppnet architectures and their components.

Since the Oppnet idea is still in its infancy, there are numerous challenges confronting Oppnets, amongst them is resource utilization. We present a novel Service Location and Planning (SLP) mechanism that enables resource utilization in Oppnets.

The second contribution of this Thesis, is the definition and implementation of the novel SLP problem as a mathematical model that can be solved optimallyfor small-scale networks. We also solve SLP problem for large networks using Lagrangean Relaxation.

The SLP mechanism meets consumers' requests, by installing the requested service on a node, that not only minimizes service installation costs, but also promotes service federation (i.e. multiple services installed on a node), and abides by consumer-defined quality of service (QoS) and realistic network parameters. This realistic modeling accounts for consumer-defined QoS constraints of throughput and delay, the underlying network link layer bandwidth capacities, and the important factor of cost to the provider.

In this Thesis, we show feasibility of Oppnets, with the design and implementation of MicroOppnet and discuss the SLP mechanism and its implementation and application to Oppnets.

Comments

5th Advisor: Dr. Matt Mutka

Access Setting

Dissertation-Open Access

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