Pang-Chieh Wang

A wrapper and broker model for collaboration between a set-top box and home service gateway

If interactive digital television (iDTV) and residential service gateway (RG) could converge, i.e. to share services and resources, add-on values could be created. We propose a wrapper (adaptor) and a broker model with cooperative interfaces and a communication mechanism to support the collaboration between instances of iDTV and RG. The proposed approach has a higher extensibility, and it is better suited to an object oriented approach. Our experimental target iDTV middleware is DVB/MHP Java Profile, and the Residential Gateway middleware is the open service gateway initiative (OSGi). The MHP and OSGi are implemented on a single Java virtual machine. The MHP application manager is wrapped as a bundle, and a broker is responsible for communication between the MHP and the OSGi. Hence, application developers do not need to know beforehand which services are on the iDTV or RG, and services are discovered dynamically.

Advanced OSGi Security Layer

This paper first discusses the inner security of OSGi and proposes an advanced OSGi security layer to prevent services from attacking the OSGi platform. We review the existing threats in Java security and we rephrase the threats within OSGi service level. A rule-based control list and a threat detector are introduced to the OSGi framework. A software sensor is deployed in our design which detects service behaviors. The behaviors can be analyzed by the detector, which notifies the response manager to perform pre-defined rules. Malicious services that are harmful to other services or OSGi framework can be stopped so that other services work safely in the open environment.

Design of an In-vehicle Anti-theft Component

An in-vehicle anti-theft approach, named GIVAC (group identification of in-vehicle anti-theft component), is proposed. The approach proposes that each valuable appliance should be integrated with an GIVAC component which will not enable the functions of the appliances if it should find itself is illegally moved to another car. Each GIVAC-enabled appliance would authenticate itself with the authorized center of the car, upon power-on, to see if it is in the right car (group). The authorized center can also be controlled by the immobilizer. Such an approach would aggregate the anti-theft capability of cars.

Classification and Evaluation of Middleware Collaboration Architectures for Converging MHP and OSGi in a Smart Home

If Interactive Digital Television (IDTV) and Residential Service Gateway (RG) converge, i.e. to share services and resources, add-on values or new services could be created. We assume that a user will have an IDTV instance and an RG instance. These two can be implemented on a single machine or each on a separate machine connected by a network. Collaboration architectures of IDTV and RG support the converged IDTV and RG services. We first make a classification of the collaboration architectures to be: RG based on IDTV, IDTV based on RG, or networked IDTV-RG implementations. Secondly, we propose the use of Proxy design pattern for collaboration between IDTV and RG. Thirdly, we implemented the Proxy design pattern for all collaboration architectures. Finally, we evaluated (1) their required efforts in lines of code modified/enhanced, (2) quantitative performance metrics, such as memory usage, system startup time, object registry time and method invocation time, and (3) qualitative metrics, such as bilateral call, dynamic upgrade, cohesion, and coupling. The experimental target IDTV middleware was DVB/ MHP Java Profile, and the Residential Gateway middleware was Open Service Gateway initiative (OSGi).

A Collaboration Proxy for Converging UPnP and Jini Devices Based on OSGi

We design and implement a Collaboration Proxy to integrate devices on the open service platform, OSGi. The proposed architecture is easy to converge various service oriented applications. Further by the API of the Proxy, new applications across the devices of different domains, such as UPnP and Jini, can be created. .The Proxy is a component module of the OSGi Bundle. A prototype that enables Jini clients to access UPnP services and vice versa is implemented to demonstrate the proposed approach.

A service-layer diagnostic approach for the OSGi framework

The open service gateway initiative (OSGi) framework is to provide an open environment for home services, which can be deployed by different service providers. However, currently there is no total solution for the OSGi framework to diagnose and recover from unexpected faults, especially those generated by resource conflicts between services, which would require user intervention. This paper summarizes the requirements for diagnosis in the open service platform and proposes an integrated approach to detect service conflict faults, handle general exceptions, and diagnose service errors on OSGi platforms. By providing user friendly diagnosis messages, and suggestions to fix exceptions, users can operate home gateways without a heavy learning burden, and service providers can reduce the overhead associated with user requests for technical support. The implementation is packaged as a service bundle running on the service layer of the OSGi platform. This is the first attempt to diagnose and handle the service conflicts on the OSGi platform during runtime.

Resource-aware service deployment for open service gateway in home network

This paper addresses the issue if a home gateway is capable of running the to-be-downloaded new services or bundles. Such an issue has been ignored in applications for personal computers or for dedicated embedded systems. However, for a home gateway that connects home appliances either wired or wirelessly to internet, users are free to choose new services. We assume that most home users of gateways are not familiar with the settings of the middleware on gateways. Hence once a new service should degrade the performance of the gateway, the problem is dramatic because the user would not know how to kill or stop the service. Our approach is to design and develop a tool which measures and evaluates both the resource requirements of the to-be downloaded service(s) and the remaining capability of the target gateway before deployment. This tool is assumed to be applied by system operators. The size of the tool is 45 KBytes and its overhead is 12 ms in average, as measured with testing services on a PC- based OSGi (open service gateway initiatives) platform.

A “Try before you buy” approach for networked digital home appliances and services

Though many services are developed and provided for digital homes, a user would both pay for a physical device (appliance) and supporting software (applications and/or services). However, a service or an appliance may only be needed in a period, such as a rental service, or a trial usage. Hence we propose a “Try before you buy” solution for networked digital home appliances and services. The idea is to have an authentication scheme to identify the appliance and/or the service based on the device in reasonable legal use at the right place and in the right time period. The appliance has the ability of self checking about the rental agreement and target environment (the user information), and the appliance or the service based on it connects to the home network gateway to check the lease term itself or check with the service provider.

Personalized iDTV Program in Multimedia Home Platform

Interactive digital TV (iDTV) plays an important role of the future home entertainment. There are a lot of differences between iDTV and traditional TV, such as protocols, standards and operations. The iDTV is more complicated and provides more applications. Under the framework of iDTV, it can provide interactive TV programs for users. An interactive TV program of a channel can bring one or more applications, and a user should choose and use the application. When a user chooses one TV program in a channel, he/she can not know other applications which go with programs in other channels. It means that a user is restricted to select applications of one channel. It is not convenient for a user who wants to watch channel A but also wants to uses the applications of channel B. This paper provides an new design of enhancement to solve the problem on the iDTV middleware. In addition, an extended iDTV program for personalization is also proposed to resolve resource conflict.

A Portable Feather-Weight Java-Based Graphic Library for Embedded Systems on Java Processor

This research tries to improve the portability of Java AWT(Abstract Window Toolkit) for embedded systems. We want to have a new graphic library which is easier to port than current AWT and to shorten the porting time. The proposed graphic library consists of two layers. The bottom (native) layer defines a minimum set of graphic primitives that needs porting, and all the other AWT required primitives are group into the upper (Java) layer. We implemented the graphic library to support AWT on two configurations. One is a purely software Implementation and the other is equipped with a Java processor. The performance of the former is not practical, and the latter has good improvements as compared with the former. Further enhancement to the proposed library is undertaking.