The APEX Framework: Prototyping of Ubiquitous Environments Based on Petri Nets

Abstract

Abstract. The user experience of ubiquitous environments is a determining factor in their success. The characteristics of such systems must be explored as early as possible to anticipate potential user problems, and to reduce the cost of redesign. However, the development of early prototypes to be evaluated in the target environment can be disruptive to the ongoing system and therefore unacceptable. This paper reports on an ongoing effort to explore how model-based rapid prototyping of ubiquitous environments might be used to avoid actual deployment while still enabling users to interact with a representation of the system. The paper describes APEX, a framework that brings together an existing 3D Application Server with CPN Tools. APEX-based prototypes enable users to navigate a virtual world simulation of the envisaged ubiquitous environment. The APEX architecture and the proposed CPN-based modelling approach are described. An example illustrates their use.

Computer Games as Virtual Environments for Safety-Critical Software Validation

“…These solutions are different from OR/TS2JC as the visualizations have to be created from scratch but without a limited domain (railways), they connect with formally developed software on the specification and not implementation level and are limited to one formal method. The same can be said about the APEX framework [15], which connects a multi-user 3D application server for creation and running of 3D virtual environments called OpenSimulator 4 , with CPN Tools 5 an editor, simulator and analyser for Coloured Petri nets (CPN) formal method. The APEX is similar to our work in utilizing an existing tool (OpenSimulator) to create virtual environments with entities managed by formally developed controllers (by CPN in APEX).…”

A Smart Home Context-aware Model Based On UML and Colored Petri Net

“…Transitions were represented actions, and arc expressions or guard functions were used to describe conditions. Silva et al, [12] proposed a smart library modeling based on CPN. The features of entities (user, object) were represented by the colored token, the states of entities were represented by places, and a token in a place was represented an entity.…”

A Virtual Environment based Serious Game to Support Health Education

“…APEX (rApid Prototyping for user EXperience) [5] is a framework for the rapid prototyping of ubicomp environments, enabling their simulation and analysis in the early stages of development. The platform consists of a number of components providing support for prototyping at different levels.…”

“…The paper illustrates the use of a framework called APEX, that is designed to prototype ubicomp environments [5], to support the rapid development of serious games. Ubicomp environments provide personalized services to users within physical spaces through the integration of environmental information using sensors.…”