An Internet Framework for Pervasive Sensor Computing

The rapid increase of sensor networks has brought a revolution in pervasive computing. However, data from these fragmented and heterogeneous sensor networks are easily shared. Existing sensor computing environments are based on the traditional database approach, in which sensors are tightly coupled with specific applications. Such static configurations are effective only in situations where all the participating sources are precisely known to the application developers, and users are aware of the applications. A pervasive computing environment raises more challenges, due to ad hoc user requests and the vast number of available sources, making static integration less effective. This paper presents an Internet framework called iSEE (Internet Sensor Exploration Environment) which provides a more complete environment for pervasive sensor computing. iSEE enables advertising and sharing of sensors and applications on the Internet with unsolicited users much like how Web pages are publicly shared today.