Skip to main content
SpringerLink
Log in

A file system for system programming in ubiquitous computing

  • Original Article
  • Published:
Personal and Ubiquitous Computing Aims and scope Submit manuscript

Abstract

In Ubiquitous computing, small embedded sensor and computing nodes are the main enabling technologies. System programming for such small embedded systems is a challenging task involving various hardware components with different characteristics. This paper presents a file system which organizes all computational and sensory functionality of a sensor node as resources in a uniform name space. It further provides a lightweight and uniform access model for all these resources. This mechanism forms an abstraction from different hardware, makes functions re-useable and simplifies the development on such systems. With ParticleFS a concrete file system implementation on a sensor node platform is shown. Application cases demonstrate sensor logging, an interactive shell, executables, a pipe mechanism and remote access capabilities of the ParticleFS.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this article

Log in via an institution

Price excludes VAT (USA)
Tax calculation will be finalised during checkout.

Instant access to the full article PDF.

Institutional subscriptions

Fig. 1
Fig. 2
Fig. 3
Fig. 4
Fig. 5
Fig. 6

Similar content being viewed by others

References

  1. Kidd CD, Orr RJ, Abowd G, Atkeson CA, Essa I, MacIntyre B, Mynatt E, Starner T, Newstetter W (1999) The aware home: a living laboratory for Ubiquitous computing research. In the Proceedings of CoBuild’99

  2. Neustaedter C, Greenberg S (2003) The design of a context-aware home media space: the video. In: video proceedings of UBICOMP 2003, Seattle, USA

  3. Beigl M, Zimmer T, Krohn A, Decker C, Robinson P (2003) Smart-its—Communication and sensing technology for UbiComp environments. Technical report ISSN 1432-7864

  4. Hill J, Szewczyk R, Woo A, Hollar S, Culler D, Pister K (2000) System architecture directions for networked sensors. ASPLOS-IX

  5. Ember —Wireless Semiconductor Solutions. Available from: http://www.ember.com/

  6. Tapia EM, Intille S, Larson K (2004) MITes: wireless portable sensors for studying behavior. In: Adjunct demo proceedings of UBICOMP 2004, Nottingham, UK

  7. TecO particle computer: http://www.particle.teco.edu [Accessed: 7/2005]

  8. Kasten O, Römer K (2005) Beyond event handlers: programming wireless sensors with attributed state machines. The fourth international conference on information processing in sensor networks (IPSN), Los Angeles, USA, pp 45–52

  9. Decker C, Krohn A, Beigl M, Zimmer T (2005) The particle computer system. In: Proceedings of the ACM/IEEE fourth international conference on information processing in sensor networks (IPSN), Los Angeles, USA

  10. Beigl M, Zimmer T, Krohn A, Decker C, Robinson P (2004) Creating ad-hoc pervasive computing environments. In the adjunct video proceedings of the pervasive, Vienna, Austria

  11. Decker C, Beigl M, Krohn A, Kubach U, Robinson P (2004) eSeal—A system for enhanced electronic assertion of authenticity and integrity of sealed items. Pervasive 2004

  12. The OpenGroup. IEEE Std 1003.1, 2004 Edition. Available online: http://www.unix.org/single_unix_specification/ [Accessed: 09/2004]

  13. Beigl M, Krohn A, Zimmer T, Decker C, Robinson P (2003) AwareCon: situation aware context communication. In: Proceedings of UBICOMP 2003, Seattle, USA

  14. Pike R, Presotto D, Dorwards S, Flandrena B, Thompson K, Trickey H, Winterbottom P (1995) Plan 9 from Bell Labs. Comput Syst 8(3):221–254

    Google Scholar 

  15. Lamarca A, Rodrig M (2004) Oasis: an architecture for simplified data management and disconnected operation. In: ARCS 2004, Augsburg, Germany

    Google Scholar 

  16. Hess C, Campbell R (2003) An application of a context-aware file system. Person Ubiquit Comput December 2003, ISSN:1617-4909, 7(6):339–352

    Google Scholar 

  17. BTnodes - A distributed environment for prototyping ad hoc networks. Available online: http://www.btnode.ethz.ch [Accessed: 01/2005]

  18. Gay D (2005) The matchbox file system. Available online: http://www.webs.cs.berkeley.edu/tos/tinyos-1.x/doc/matchbox-design.pdf [Accessed: 01/2005]

Download references

Acknowledgements

The work presented in this paper was partially funded by the European Community through the project CoBIs (Collaborative Business Items) under contract no. 4270 and by the Ministry of Economic Affairs of the Netherlands through the BSIK project Smart Surroundings under contract no. 03060.

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. TecO, University of Karlsruhe, Vincenz-Priessnitz Str. 1, 76131, Karlsruhe, Germany

    Christian Decker, Till Riedel, Michael Beigl & Albert Krohn

Authors
  1. Christian Decker
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  2. Till Riedel
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  3. Michael Beigl
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

  4. Albert Krohn
    View author publications

    You can also search for this author in PubMed Google Scholar

Corresponding author

Correspondence to Christian Decker.

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

About this article

Cite this article

Decker, C., Riedel, T., Beigl, M. et al. A file system for system programming in ubiquitous computing. Pers Ubiquit Comput 11, 21–31 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s00779-005-0060-5

Download citation

  • Received:

  • Accepted:

  • Published:

  • Issue Date:

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s00779-005-0060-5

Keywords

Search

Navigation