skip to main content
10.1145/1286380.1286389acmotherconferencesArticle/Chapter ViewAbstractPublication PagesdmsnConference Proceedingsconference-collections
Article

Workflow support for wireless sensor and actor networks: a position paper

Published: 24 September 2007 Publication History

Abstract

As initial challenges of wireless sensor and actor networks (WSANs) are overcome, their application possibilities evolve. For these applications to move mainstream, efficient programming methods are required which can be used by domain experts. So far, the question of how can WSANs be efficiently programmed remains unanswered. In this paper we examine proposed middleware approaches, and show that they have focused on data extraction rather than in-network actuation. We thus propose the usage of workflows as a means to define the logic that orchestrates the network activity, and introduce a language to express WSAN interactions. At this time, a concrete system is not given, but the paper discusses the relevant aspects towards one, and poses many questions for future research.

References

[1]
I. Akyildiz and I. Kasimoglu. Wireless Sensor and Actor Networks: Research Challenges. Ad Hoc Networks, 2(4):351--367, October 2004.
[2]
I. Akyildiz, W. Su, Y. Sankarasubramaniam, and E. Cayirci. Wireless Sensor Networks: a Survey. Computer Networks, 38:393--422, 2002.
[3]
A. Awan, S. Jagannathan, and A. Grama. Macroprogramming Heterogeneous Sensor Networks using Cosmos. In EuroSys'07, March 2007.
[4]
P. Bonnet, J. Gehrke, and P. Seshadri. Querying the Physical World. IEEE Personal Communications, 7:10--15, October 2000.
[5]
C. Fok, G. Roman, and C. Lu. Agilla: A Mobile Agent Middleware for Sensor Networks. Technical Report WUCSE-2006-16, Wa. Univ. in St. Louis, March 2006.
[6]
D. Gay, P. Levis, R. von Behren, M. Welsh, E. Brewer, and D. Culler. The nesC Language: A Holistic Approach to Networked Embedded Systems. In PLDI'03, pages 1--11, New York, NY, USA, June 2003. ACM Press.
[7]
R. Gummadi, O. Gnawali, and R. Govindan. Macro-programming Wireless Sensor Networks using Kairos. In 1st DCOSS, pages 126--140, June 2005
[8]
S. Hadim and N. Mohamed. Middleware Challenges and Approaches for Wireless Sensor Networks. IEEE Distributed Systems Online, 7(3), March 2006.
[9]
K. Henricksen and R. Robinson. A Survey of Middleware for Sensor Networks: State-of-the-Art and Future Directions. In MidSens'06, pages 60--65, New York, USA, 2006. ACM Press.
[10]
J. Hill, R. Szewczyk, A. Woo, S. Hollar, D. Culler, and K. Pister. System Architecture Directions for Networked Sensors. In ASPLOS-IX, pages 93--104, December 2000.
[11]
H. Karl and A. Willig. Protocols and Architectures for Wireless Sensor Networks. Wiley & Sons, June 2005.
[12]
S. Kim, S. Pakzad, D. Culler, J. Demmel, G. Fenves, S. Glaser, and M. Turon. Health Monitoring of Civil Infrastructures Using Wireless Sensor Networks. In 6th IPSN, pages 254--263, New York, NY, USA, 2007.
[13]
K. Langendoen, A. Baggio, and O. Visser. Murphy Loves Potatoes: Experiences from a Pilot Sensor Network Deployment in Precision Agriculture. In 14th WPDRTS, April 2006.
[14]
P. Levis and D. Culler. Maté: A Tiny Virtual Machine for Sensor Networks. In ASPLOS-X, pages 85--95, New York, NY, USA, October 2002. ACM Press.
[15]
J. Liu, M. Chu, J. Liu, J. Reich, and F. Zhao. State-Centric Programming for Sensor-Actuator Network Systems. IEEE Pervasive Computing, 02(4):50--62, October 2003.
[16]
S. Madden, M. Franklin, J. Hellerstein, and W. Hong. TAG: a Tiny AGgregation Service for Ad-hoc Sensor Networks. 5th USENIX OSDI, 36(SI):131--146, 2002.
[17]
S. Madden, M. Franklin, J. Hellerstein, and W. Hong. TinyDB: an Acquisitional Query Processing System for Sensor Networks. ACM Transactions on Database Systems, 30(1):122--173, March 2005.
[18]
A. Mainwaring, J. Polastre, R. Szewczyk, D. Culler, and J. Anderson. Wireless Sensor Networks for Habitat Monitoring. In 1st ACM Intl. Workshop on Wireless Sensor Networks and Applications, pages 88--97, New York, NY, USA, September 2002.
[19]
K. Martinez, P. Padhy, A. Elsaify, G. Zou, A. Riddoch, J. K. Hart, and H. L. R. Ong. Deploying a Sensor Network in an Extreme Environment. In IEEE SUTC, volume 1, pages 186--193, June 2006.
[20]
T. Melodia, D. Pompili, V. C. Gungor, and I. Akyildiz. A Distributed Coordination Framework for Wireless Sensor and Actor Networks. In 6th MobiHoc, pages 99--110, New York, NY, USA, 2005. ACM Press.
[21]
D. Mosberger. Memory Consistency Models. Operating Systems Review, 27(1):18--26, January 1993.
[22]
R. Müller, D. Kossmann, and G. Alonso. A Virtual Machine for Sensor Networks. In EuroSys'07, Mar. 07.
[23]
T. Murata. Petri nets: Properties, Analysis and Applications. Procs. IEEE, 77(4):541--580, April 1989.
[24]
R. Newton, Arvind, and M. Welsh. Building up to Macroprogramming: an Intermediate Language for Sensor Networks. In 4th IPSN, pages 6--13, 2005.
[25]
R. Newton and M. Welsh. Region Streams: Functional Macroprogramming for Sensor Networks. In 1st DMSN, pages 78--87, Toronto, Canada, August 2004. ACM Press.
[26]
K. Pister, J. Kahn, and B. Boser. Smart Dust: Autonomous Sensing and Communication in a Cubic Millimeter, http://robotics.eecs.berkeley.edu/~pister/SmartDust/, 1999.
[27]
G. Pottie and W. Kaiser. Wireless Integrated Network Sensors. Comm. of the ACM, 43(5):51--58, 2000.
[28]
V. Prasanna, J. Reich, A. Bakshi, and D. Larner. The Abstract Task Graph: a Methodology for Architecture-Independent Programming of Networked Sensor Systems. EESR'05 Workshop, pages 19--24, June 2005.
[29]
K. Römer, C. Frank, P. Marrón, and C. Becker. Generic Role Assignment for Wireless Sensor Networks. In 11th ACM SIGOPS European Workshop, pages 7--12, Leuven, Belgium, September 2004.
[30]
K. Römer, O. Kasten, and F. Mattern. Middleware Challenges for Wireless Sensor Networks. SIGMOBILE Mob. Comput. Commun. Rev., 6(4):59--61, October 2002.
[31]
A. Sharp and P. McDermott. Workflow Modeling: Tools for Process Improvement and Application Development. Artech House Computing Library, Norwood, MA, April 2001.
[32]
J. Steffan, L. Fiege, M. Cilia, and A. Buchmann. Scoping in Wireless Sensor Networks: A Position Paper. In 2nd Workshop on Middleware for Pervasive and Ad-hoc Computing, pages 167--171, October 2004.
[33]
M. Strohbach, G. Kortuem, and H. Gellersen. Cooperative Artefacts - A Framework for Embedding Knowledge in Real World Objects. In Smart Object Systems Workshop at UbiComp 2005, September 2005.
[34]
K. Terfloth and J. Schiller. Driving Forces Behind Middleware Concepts for Wireless Sensor Networks. In Workshop on Real-World WSNs, June 2005.
[35]
W. van der Aalst, A. Hofstede, B. Kiepuszewski, and A. Barros. Workflow Patterns. Distributed and Parallel Databases, 14(1):5--51, July 2003.
[36]
M. Welsh and G. Mainland. Programming Sensor Networks Using Abstract Regions. In 1st USENIX/ACM NSDI, pages 29--42, March 2004.
[37]
G. Werner-Allen, K. Lorincz, M. Welsh, O. Marcillo, J. Johnson, M. Ruiz, and J. Lees. Deploying a Wireless Sensor Network on an Active Volcano. IEEE Internet Computing, 10(2):18--25, 2006.
[38]
K. Whitehouse, C. Sharp, E. Brewer, and D. Culler. Hood: A Neighborhood Abstraction for Sensor Networks. In 2nd MobySys, pages 99--110, June 2004.
[39]
D. Wodtke and G. Weikum. A Formal Foundation for Distributed Workflow Execution Based on State Charts. In 6th Intl. Conference on Database Theory, volume 1186 of LNCS, pages 230--246, January 1997.
[40]
N. Xu, S. Rangwala, K. Chintalapudi, D. Ganesan, A. Broad, R. Govindan, and D. Estrin. A Wireless Sensor Network for Structural Monitoring. In 2nd SenSys, pages 13--24, November 2004.
[41]
Y. Yu, B. Krishnamachari, and V. Prasanna. Issues in Designing Middleware for Wireless Sensor Networks. IEEE Network, 18(1):15--21, January 2004.

Cited By

View all
  • (2014)Using Policies for Handling Complexity of Event-Driven ArchitecturesSoftware Architecture10.1007/978-3-319-09970-5_12(114-129)Online publication date: 2014
  • (2010)UML2 activity diagram based programming of wireless sensor networksProceedings of the 2010 ICSE Workshop on Software Engineering for Sensor Network Applications10.1145/1809111.1809116(8-13)Online publication date: 3-May-2010
  • (2010)Distributed Collaborative Control for Industrial Automation With Wireless Sensor and Actuator NetworksIEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics10.1109/TIE.2010.204303857:12(4219-4230)Online publication date: Dec-2010
  1. Workflow support for wireless sensor and actor networks: a position paper

    Recommendations

    Comments

    Information & Contributors

    Information

    Published In

    cover image ACM Other conferences
    DMSN '07: Proceedings of the 4th workshop on Data management for sensor networks: in conjunction with 33rd International Conference on Very Large Data Bases
    September 2007
    46 pages
    ISBN:9781595939111
    DOI:10.1145/1286380
    • General Chairs:
    • Amol Deshpande,
    • Qiong Luo
    Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

    Sponsors

    • Intel: Intel

    Publisher

    Association for Computing Machinery

    New York, NY, United States

    Publication History

    Published: 24 September 2007

    Permissions

    Request permissions for this article.

    Check for updates

    Qualifiers

    • Article

    Conference

    VLDB '07
    Sponsor:
    • Intel

    Acceptance Rates

    Overall Acceptance Rate 6 of 16 submissions, 38%

    Contributors

    Other Metrics

    Bibliometrics & Citations

    Bibliometrics

    Article Metrics

    • Downloads (Last 12 months)1
    • Downloads (Last 6 weeks)1
    Reflects downloads up to 20 Feb 2025

    Other Metrics

    Citations

    Cited By

    View all
    • (2014)Using Policies for Handling Complexity of Event-Driven ArchitecturesSoftware Architecture10.1007/978-3-319-09970-5_12(114-129)Online publication date: 2014
    • (2010)UML2 activity diagram based programming of wireless sensor networksProceedings of the 2010 ICSE Workshop on Software Engineering for Sensor Network Applications10.1145/1809111.1809116(8-13)Online publication date: 3-May-2010
    • (2010)Distributed Collaborative Control for Industrial Automation With Wireless Sensor and Actuator NetworksIEEE Transactions on Industrial Electronics10.1109/TIE.2010.204303857:12(4219-4230)Online publication date: Dec-2010

    View Options

    Login options

    View options

    PDF

    View or Download as a PDF file.

    PDF

    eReader

    View online with eReader.

    eReader

    Figures

    Tables

    Media

    Share

    Share

    Share this Publication link

    Share on social media