Petri Vuorimaa

Integration platform for home and building automation systems

In future buildings, all devices will be connected directly to the Internet, surrounding people with a Web of Things. That will bring the amazing possibility to control building facilities from any device with Internet access (PC, mobile phone, etc.). However, while it is already technically possible to connect devices directly to IP networks, most of home and building automation systems still use non-IP field level communication protocols. In this paper we describe an integration platform, which is an intermediate step between future IP based systems and available legacy equipment. The platform uses Web services technology for connecting devices to a stand-alone server. This approach makes the system flexible and independent from underlying platform and communication protocols. Conducted measurements with our oBIX based implementation show that our system model is efficient and can be deployed on cheap embedded devices with limited resources for computing.

Toward Unified Web Application Development

Web application development in the context of the conventional three-tier architecture is complex, typically requiring a team of experts. Recent Web application architectures and frameworks simplify the development process, potentially turning tier-specific experts into one-person developer teams.

Engaging end users in real smart space programming

Smart spaces, either public or private, has been a hot topic for more than a decade. They are claimed to bring various advantages for their users. However, only few people are actually using smart spaces. One of the reasons for that is the lack of attention paid to user interfaces used to control the space. Both industrial and academic research is often focused on hardware and device interoperability issues. There is not enough studies about end-user mental models, how and why people want to control and program smart spaces. In this position paper, we propose a strategy of how to bring end-user programming in smart spaces into real life. Our idea is three-fold: 1) concentrate on users mental models, 2) create intuitive ubiquitous user interface, which combines the direct interaction pattern and the magnetic poetry interface metaphor, and 3) install a control system in a public smart space, where a lot of people can use it on daily basis. We aim to conduct a long term user study, from which we are planning to get unique data about evolution of peoples expectations and mental models in the context of smart space control.

Leveraging declarative languages in web application development

Web Applications have become an omnipresent part of our daily lives. They are easy to use, but hard to develop. WYSIWYG editors, form builders, mashup editors, and markup authoring tools ease the development of Web Applications. However, more advanced Web Applications require servers-side programming, which is beyond the skills of end-user developers. In this paper, we discuss how declarative languages can simplify Web Application development and empower end-users as Web developers. We first identify nine end-user Web Application development levels ranging from simple visual customization to advanced three-tier programming. Then, we propose expanding the presentation tier to support all aspects of Web Application development. We introduce a unified XForms-based framework—called XFormsDB—that supports both client-side and server-side Web Application development. Furthermore, we make a language extension proposal—called XFormsRTC—for adding true real-time communication capabilities to XForms. We also present XFormsDB Integrated Development Environment (XIDE), which assists end-users in authoring highly interactive data-driven Web Applications. XIDE supports all Web Application development levels and, especially, promotes the transition from markup authoring and snippet programming to single and unified language programming.

Active life home: a portal-based home care platform

Assistive devices help elderly persons to live longer in their homes. Unfortunately, the devices on the market are incompatible with each other. Also, integration to higher-level services is an open issue. In this article, we propose a portal-based home care platform that integrates together multiple assistive devices and their online services. The integration is done at three levels: service, information, and device. At the service level, we use portal technology to integrate together Personal Health Record (PHR), external services, and web-based device user interfaces. At the information level, we integrate the different devices and services to the PHR using REST-based web services. At the device level, we use a home automation gateway to connect the different devices to the PHR and portal. We tested the architecture in a living lab environment. The results show that multiple integration levels improve the flexibility of home health care systems.

Extending XForms with server-side functionality

Most Web applications are based on a conventional three-tier architecture, in which the presentation, application logic, and data management are developed and maintained in separate tiers. The main disadvantage of this architecture is that it requires expertise in multiple programming languages, programming paradigms, and data models used in each tier. A single expert rarely masters all technologies involved. In this paper, we introduce a framework that allows users---namely, Web designers---to implement entire Web applications using only markup languages. In addition, all application development is performed on the client side, simplifying both development and maintenance work. The proposed framework is based on the XForms markup language and its server-side extension proposed in this paper. We derive the extension requirements from the literature and depict its function using a simple Web-based blog application. We also show how the extension can be implemented as part of a comprehensive Web application development framework called XFormsDB. Our conclusion is that expanding the presentation tier to define both application logic and data management functionality makes both the development and maintenance of small- and medium-sized Web applications easier.

Anticipatory lighting in smart building

Assistive living technologies can help the elderly and the people with disabilities with their daily life. The smart building solutions provide means to implement these systems in homes and can offer valuable applications, for example, an alarming service notifying relatives in case of irregular behavior. However, different systems are generally not able to intelligently communicate with each other, decreasing the usability of such technologies. We propose a new kind of general smart building system model aiming for flexibility and interoperability by offering different parts of the system to behave and cooperate intelligently. We present our implementation of the system with an anticipation method for the lighting control. It anticipates users intention to enter to the space and thus removes the general system delay and offers more comfortable experience for the user.

TouchModifier: enriched multi-touch gestures for tablet browsers

Touch-based web browsing with tablet devices is not yet utilizing its full potential. This paper introduces an asymmetric bimanual interaction technique that makes browser-based multi-touch gestures more expressive. In the proposed TouchModifier technique, a semi-transparent panel with modifier controls is docked to the side of the screen. The non-dominant hand operates the side panel, while the dominant hand interacts with the application content as usual. The controls on the side panel operate as fluid mode selectors that enrich and override the semantics of the dominant hand gestures. This opens novel interaction possibilities in browser applications, while remaining interoperable with existing web pages. In this paper, we describe the proposed concept and present its prototype implementation with a use case.

XFormsDB: a declarative web application framework

Most Web applications utilize a three-tier architecture, in which the presentation, application logic, and data management are implemented as separate tiers. The disadvantage of this popular approach is that it usually requires expertise in multiple programming languages and paradigms as well as data models used in each tier. A single expert rarely masters all the technologies involved. In this demonstration, we give an overview of the XFormsDB framework that allows developers to implement entire Web applications using only markup languages. The framework is based on the XForms markup language and our server-side extensions. We demonstrate the functionality of the framework using a simple blog application as an example.

XFormsDB: an extensible web application framework built upon declarative W3C standards

Most Web applications are based on a conventional three-tier architecture, in which the presentation, application logic, and data management are developed and maintained in separate tiers. The main disadvantage of this architecture is that it requires expertise in multiple programming languages, programming paradigms, and data models used in each tier. A single expert rarely masters all the technologies and concepts involved. In this paper, we introduce a tier-expanding architectural approach that unifies the client-side (presentation tier) and server-side (logic and data tiers) programming under a single model. We base our approach on a W3C-standardized client-side markup language, XForms, and its server-side extension proposed in this paper. We derive the extension requirements from the literature and use cases, and demonstrate their functionality on the example of a blog Web application. We also show how the extension can be implemented as part of a comprehensive Web application framework called XFormsDB. The XFormsDB framework is an extensible Web application framework built upon declarative W3C standards. It has four major advantages: (1) one programming language, (2) one data model, (3) based on W3C-standardized declarative markup, and (4) extensibility in all tiers. Our conclusion is that expanding the presentation tier to cover both application logic and data management functionality makes both the development and maintenance of small- and medium-sized Web applications easier.