A Model-Driven Approach to Unravel the Interoperability Problem of the Internet of Things

Abstract

The Internet of Things (IoT) aims for connecting Anything, Anywhere, Anytime (AAA). This premise brings about heterogeneity that creates connectivity challenges. These challenges constitutes a serious obstacle to interoperability between things. Most existing approaches tackles the interoperability problem by avoiding heterogeneity with standards at runtime. While heterogeneity is an intrinsic feature of the IoT, there is a need for an approach that embraces it to connect AAA. In this paper we propose a model-based methodology to tackle the interoperability problem. It relies on a Domain-Specific Language (DSL) for a model-based specification of the network and a transformation process to generate the network artifacts from this specification. The principle consists of achieving interoperability at the model-level, then during a transformation process, ensuring that it is preserved in the low-level code. Adopting this methodology makes the engineering of the IoT more rigorous, prevents bugs earlier and saves time.

A Model-Driven Methodology to Accelerate Software Engineering in the Internet of Things

“…This paper extends two of our conference papers [20], [7] by introducing a comprehensive software engineering methodology for the IoT, with clearly defined modeling concerns (Section IV-A) and software engineering tasks (Section III), a conflict detection mechanism (Section V-F), additional code generation procedures (Section VI), and a quantitative evaluation (Section VII). Concretely, the methodology enables a) the modeling and validation of a network of things, b) the ability to constrain this network with a policy, and c) the generation of the network's artifacts by means of state-of-the-art MDE techniques.…”

“…According to our literature review, we noticed a lack of a full-scale, documented, and open-source approach for modeling a network of things generically. Moreover, only a few approaches [42], [43], [44], [45] leverage the power of MDE for the automatic code generation of a complete network, which can consequently reduce the redundant tasks and help tackle the interoperability problem of the IoT [7].…”

“…In fact, due to variation in sizes of things, an interoperability issue is a common trait of connectivity of things in the IoT [7]. The ability to forward an existing binding at the model-level allows navigating freely between various ranges of things.…”

“…On the other hand, heterogeneity of software technologies (e.g., languages, protocols) [6] causes, among other things, an 1 SVV Team, SnT, Université du Luxembourg -29, avenue JF Kennedy L-1855 Luxembourg -firstname.lastname@uni.lu 2 Mathematics, Computer Science and Engineering Dep. University of Quebec At Rimouski, Rimouski, QC, Canada -firstname lastname@uqar.ca 3 Naomod Team, IMT Atlantique, LS2N, Nantes, France -firstname.lastname@ls2n.fr interoperability problem by hindering communication between things [7]. Commonly, a typical IoT application contains multiple computing platforms, languages, and protocols from various ranges.…”

CyprIoT project

“…On the one hand, a typical IoT application involves many stakeholders (e.g., Security, Business, Network), each using its tools and methods [14]. On the other hand, heterogeneity of software technologies (e.g., languages, protocols) [2] causes, among other things, an interoperability problem [4] by hindering communication between things. Figure 1 depicts a common software engineering scheme for the IoT.…”