An Eclipse Plugin to Access Sun SPOT Resources
The Sun SPOT Eclipse Plugin is an Eclipse extension that provides an interface to access Sun SPOT devices in a wireless network from within the Eclipse platform, thus abstracting from all low level issues and providing a simple paradigm for any other Eclipse plug-in to look up connected Sun SPOTs, bind to a specific sensor, actuator or other UI or GPIOs, and consume or provide data to the given resource, accordingly.
The objective of Sun SPOT Plugin is to provide fine granularity so that different plug-ins can concurrently access different resources on the same device. This requirement is to be met as Sun SPOT devices aggregate an increasing number of sensors, actuators and other I/Os, thus requiring that allocation shifts from a device-level to a resource-level basis in order to enable concurrent access of different resources on the same device and improve efficiency.
Furthermore, not only actual resources are to be considered but also resource emulators. For instance, SSEP can provide access to a sensor that is not physically available on Sun SPOT devices but whose presence is emulated thanks to an algorithm. This enables development of wireless sensor network applications and their testing before the actual sensors or other resources are actually installed on the wireless device, which results in a more rapid development process as well as verifying a solution before the investment of having another sensor on the device has been made.
Sun SPOT Eclipse Plugin architecture depicted in Fig. 1 consists of an upper subsystem residing within the Eclipse Platform on the base station and another one on top the Sun SPOT's Squawk JVM. Eclipse Plugins interested in accessing Sun SPOT resources request a connection to a Sun SPOT device via the Sun SPOT Gateway within the Eclipse Platform. Subsequently, they can bind to a specific resource on the connected Sun SPOT and starts providing or consuming data.
The objective of Sun SPOT Plugin is to provide fine granularity so that different plug-ins can concurrently access different resources on the same device. This requirement is to be met as Sun SPOT devices aggregate an increasing number of sensors, actuators and other I/Os, thus requiring that allocation shifts from a device-level to a resource-level basis in order to enable concurrent access of different resources on the same device and improve efficiency.
Furthermore, not only actual resources are to be considered but also resource emulators. For instance, SSEP can provide access to a sensor that is not physically available on Sun SPOT devices but whose presence is emulated thanks to an algorithm. This enables development of wireless sensor network applications and their testing before the actual sensors or other resources are actually installed on the wireless device, which results in a more rapid development process as well as verifying a solution before the investment of having another sensor on the device has been made.
Sun SPOT Eclipse Plugin architecture depicted in Fig. 1 consists of an upper subsystem residing within the Eclipse Platform on the base station and another one on top the Sun SPOT's Squawk JVM. Eclipse Plugins interested in accessing Sun SPOT resources request a connection to a Sun SPOT device via the Sun SPOT Gateway within the Eclipse Platform. Subsequently, they can bind to a specific resource on the connected Sun SPOT and starts providing or consuming data.
Sun SPOT Eclipse Plugin architecture depicted in figure above consists of an upper subsystem residing within the Eclipse Platform on the base station and another one on top the Sun SPOT's Squawk JVM. Eclipse Plugins interested in accessing Sun SPOT resources request a connection to a Sun SPOT device via the Sun SPOT Gateway within the Eclipse Platform. Subsequently, they can bind to a specific resource on the connected Sun SPOT and starts providing or consuming data.
It is worthwhile observing that emulated resources can be accessed besides actual ones. In figure above the case of Sun SPOT accelerometer is portrayed. From the Eclipse Plugin point of view they are just plain resources and access to them matches the same pattern for actual sensors such as the accelerometer. However, a software emulator is to be present on the Sun SPOT device to either provide or consume data according to its classification as input or output.
People
- Giacomo Ghidini
Follow Computer Science