Editorial

Citation

Chen, I.L.K.L. (2014), "Editorial", International Journal of Pervasive Computing and Communications, Vol. 10 No. 2. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJPCC-04-2014-0031

Editorial

Article Type: Editorial From: International Journal of Pervasive Computing and Communications, Volume 10, Issue 2

This issue of the International Journal of Pervasive Computing and Communication contains five papers covering a couple of hot research topics, including image processing, a hybrid approach of semantic and data intensive procession of sensor data, tracking and tracing of using sensing technologies in pervasive environments and wireless network security and mobility. These papers represent and reflect the latest state of the art of research and development in these related areas which help identify opportunities and challenges for interested researchers and technology and system developers, and inspire and provoke follow-up research in the time to come. The following is a short brief for each paper.

The paper “A Study of the Application of Automatic Healthcare Tracking and Monitoring System in Saudi Arabia” describes a smart hospital management system (SHMS) which can detect, locate and monitor patients and track assets and equipment in a smart hospital environment. The system makes use of modern sensor technologies, a combination of radio-frequency identification (RFID) sensing and Zigbee communication technologies, for real-time dynamic tracking and tracing. Integrating with various healthcare systems, this system can support and speed up the development of healthcare systems and improve the performance and accuracy of management systems.

The paper “High Dynamic Range Photography without a Tripod: a Linear Formulation for Image Fusion” presents a new multi-image registration methodology which is able to align a set of handheld bracketed shots. The methodology consists of a two-step process, namely, to extract corresponding multi-image points automatically from the bracketed image sequence and to recover transformation parameters based on a least squares adjustment criteria. Then, images can be processed with high dynamic range algorithms to combine multiple low dynamic range pictures into a single mosaic with a superior radiometric quality. The paper uses simulated and real examples for evaluation to illustrate the effectiveness of the developed affine-based methods.

The paper “Mobipse: a Scenario-based Mobile-application Development for End-user Developers” introduces a lightweight method for exploring requirements and ideas for end-user development (EUD). Specifically, it introduces a scenario-based requirement exploration method, dubbed as SRE, and a lightweight software process called MobiPSE that applies SRE. Two EUD case studies have been undertaken to test and fine-tune methods. Initial results have shown that MobiPSE works in real-life scenarios which can help capture and transform vague ideas of developers into concrete application’s vision. The study has also discovered two findings, namely, ad hoc training has a limited effect and lack of technical expertise can still leave a negative impact on the requirement exploration process.

The paper “On the Application of Big Data in Future Large-Scale Intelligent Smart City Installations” addresses the performance problems of semantic modeling and inference in the context of smart city research domain. The research introduces an architecture that combines semantic models with data analytics from big data processing, i.e. sensor data stream first being processed by a big data streaming platform, and then followed by semantic processing, thus lowering the workload for the rule engine. The architecture has been implemented and evaluated using simulations of smart cities of different sizes. Initial results have shown that merely using a streaming platform as a buffer for sensor input values already increases the sensor data throughput, and that by applying intelligent filtering in the streaming platform, the actual number of rule executions can be limited to a minimum.

The paper “CMKMS: Cluster-based Mobile Key Management Scheme for Wireless Sensor Network” introduces a new cluster-based mobile key management scheme (CMKMS) to address security and mobility issues in a variety of real-time and mission-critical pervasive applications. The CMKMS algorithm focuses on the management and maintenance of keys under cluster-based mobile wireless sensor network (WSN). In particular, the paper conducts comparative studies with similar work in the research area. Initial results show that existing key management algorithms are efficient in terms of security but not scalable to the changing conditions of network and not efficient under node mobility. The proposed algorithm improves the scalability where cluster head (CH) acts as a key manager.

We would like to take this opportunity to thank all authors for their valuable contributions.

Ismail Khalil
Editor-in-Chief
Liming Luke Chen
Assistant Editor-in-Chief