| KEYWORD |
High-level end-user programming in the Internet of Things
keywords DISTRIBUTED SYSTEMS, END-USER PROGRAMMING, INTERNET OF THINGS, VISUALIZATION, WEB TECHNOLOGIES
Reference persons FULVIO CORNO
External reference persons Luigi De Russis, Teodoro Montanaro
Research Groups Intelligent and Interactive Systems - e-LITE
Thesis type RESEARCH
Description A considerable amount of research has been carried out towards enabling average users to customize the interactions between their smart devices through trigger-action (“if... then...”) programming.
This type of end-user programming in the Internet of Things (IoT) world is probably represented by the IFTTT service (if-this-then-that), that is a success in terms of user comprehension and ease of use but falls short in different areas. First, this approach is better suited to cloud-centered services and not easily to be adapted to the variety of IoT devices. Second, the programming paradigm inherently forces a "one-to-one" mapping between pairs of services instances, without any possibility of generalizing a given action across different providers. For example, it is not possible to say "when I enter a place, set the temperature to 21 degree", but you have to create many similar rules with triggers for each place and for each of their thermostats. Finally, users need to explicitly and manually enable any service that they will use, thus hindering the possibility of interacting with unknown (or yet undiscovered) services like the public ones.
This thesis aims at creating a user interface for overcoming the current limitations of trigger-action, device-to-device programming. The interface should let end-users define some sort of high-level rules that can be applied and automatically adapted to multiple devices and services. The goal of this work will be reached by applying a strong user-centered approach, starting from a requirement elicitation phase (with real users) to identify a proper format for high-level rules description and composition. The application will be, then, developed as a web or mobile application and will be validated with real users, if possible. The outcome of the thesis, if satisfying, will be made freely available as an Open Source project.
See also http://elite.polito.it/index.php/thesis/offers/274-iot-metarules
Deadline 25/02/2016
PROPONI LA TUA CANDIDATURA