Middleware Support for Generic and Flexible Actuation in the Internet of Mobile Things

Abstract

The ability to control actuators of smart objects is a central requirement of many IoT applications such as Smart Buildings, Smart Cities, and Precision Agriculture. Still, in most current IoT systems, actuation control is hard-wired and device-specific, making it impossible to deal with a dynamic and variable set of smart (and mobile) devices that have also intermittent wireless connectivity with the Internet. These are typical problems of Internet of Mobile Things (IoMT) settings, where smart objects (e.g., medical equipment, robots, UAVs, and vehicles) are not stationary. Thus, this paper describes the design, implementation and performance tests of a middleware-level service that enables generic actuation control for a heterogeneous and dynamic set of actionable smart and movable devices.