Irina Astrova

Reverse engineering of relational databases to ontologies

A majority of the work on reverse engineering has been done on extracting entity-relationship and object models from relational databases. There exist only a few approaches that consider ontologies, as the target for reverse engineering. Moreover, the existing approaches can extract only a small subset of semantics embedded within a relational database, or they can require much user interaction for semantic annotation. In our opinion, the potential source of these problems lies in that the primary focus has been on analyzing key correlation. Data and attribute correlations are considered rarely and thus, have received little or no analysis. As an attempt to resolve the problems, we propose a novel approach, which is based on an analysis of key, data and attribute correlations, as well as their combination. Our approach can be applied to migrating data-intensive Web pages, which are usually based on relational databases, into the ontology-based Semantic Web.

Rules for Mapping SQL Relational Databases to OWL Ontologies

This paper proposes an approach to automatic transformation of relational databases to ontologies, where constraints CHECK are also considered. A relational database is written in SQL and an ontology is written in OWL. The proposed approach can be used for integrating data that are scattered across many different domains and that reside in many separate relational databases.

High availability: Evaluating open source enterprise service buses

We evaluate three open source enterprise service buses (ESBs) Fuse, Mule and OpenESB, focusing on their support of high availability. Since high availability for the these ESBs relies on transactional Java messaging service (JMS) in a staged event driven architecture (SEDA), we review JMSs first. On this base, we evaluate and rate the ESBs on their support of both stateless and stateful services. We rated Fuse first, followed by Mule and OpenESB.

Applying event-driven architecture to mobile computing

Complex event processing (CEP) has been an area of intensive research in recent years. Similarly, mobile devices such as smartphones, tablets and laptops are widespread nowadays. Consequently, the integration of CEP into mobile computing is a natural idea. In this paper, we present MetaXA, an event-driven architecture (EDA) with CEP specifically designed for mobile devices, along with its application scenarios in mobile computing: notification distribution and theft detection. Among the main enhancements of MetaXA over previously published work are enabling CEP on mobile devices and leveraging a lightweight yet still platform-independent communication protocol (viz., XMPP). In addition, MetaXA features real-time communication patterns and a publish-subscribe mechanism. MetaXA is implemented on different mobile platforms: Android and Windows Phone.

Asynchronous messaging for OSGi

OSGi is a popular Java-based platform, which has its roots in the area of embedded systems. However, nowadays it is used more and more in enterprise systems. To fit this new application area, OSGi has recently been extended with the Remote Services specification. This specification enables distribution, which OSGi was previously lacking. However, the specification provides means for synchronous communication only and leaves out asynchronous communication. As an attempt to fill a gap in this field, we propose, implement and evaluate an approach for the integration of asynchronous messaging into OSGi.

Think Large, Act Small: An Approach to Web Services for Embedded Systems Based on the OSGi Framework

Traditionally, web services were used in large distributed systems. In this paper, we propose an approach to using web services in embedded systems, which have small memory footprints. At the heart of our approach lay: (1) the use of Apache CXF to extend the OSGi framework with distribution; and (2) the adaption of Apache CXF to embedded system platforms such as Java Standard Edition Embedded, JamVM and Java Micro Edition. We give examples of possible application of our approach in a car tracking system and an advertising system for car drivers.

Using MetaXA for theft detection

While mobile devices (such as smartphones, tablets and laptops) allow for more flexible and convenient business operations, they are susceptible of thefts. Surprisingly, mobile devices commonly go stolen at offices. When a mobile device is in the thefts hands, it can compromise the data on the device itself or even the data on corporate servers and networks, which can be accessed using that device. To prevent mobile device thefts as well as the related data thefts, we designed a mobile device management system called MetaXA. In addition, we implemented the system prototype on the Android platform and demonstrated how to use that prototype to detect the theft of an Android smartphone.

Power-aware notification distribution

Notification distribution is a great feature to have as: (1) it lets employees receive notifications directly on their mobile devices in near real-time; and (2) it reduces the effort required by IT administrators to manage a diverse fleet of mobile devices and platforms. However, it should take into account the fact that the battery lives of mobile devices have been decreasing a lot over the last past years because other features offered by mobile devices like WiFi, Bluetooth and GPS get drained their batteries very quickly. Therefore, notification distribution should seek to minimize its impact on battery power.

Security of a Public Cloud

This paper is about the current state of security in cloud computing. It shows some of the key benefits and the major drawbacks that come around with swapping out services and infrastructure to a public cloud. Based on these benefits and drawbacks, K.O. (knock-out) criteria will be identified, which can be seen as the minimum basis for secure cloud environment. Then a final conclusion about security in cloud computing will be given.

Comparison of enterprise service buses based on their support of high availability

In this paper, we compare and evaluate four enterprise service buses -- Fuse, Mule, OpenESB and Artix -- based on their support of high availability. We rate Artix first, followed by Fuse, Mule and OpenESB. These rates are based on the fault tolerance test results as well as the published documentation from providers.