Birla Institute of Technology & Science, Pilani

Distance Learning Programmes Division

Second Semester 2008-2009
Comprehensive Examination (EC-2 Regular)

Course No. : SS ZG531

Course Title : PERVASIVE COMPUTING
Nature of Exam : Open Book
Weightage : 60% No. of Pages =2
Duration : 3 Hours No. of Questions = 6
Date of Exam : 05/04/2009 (FN)
Note:
1. Please follow all the Instructions to Candidates given on the cover page of the answer book.
2. All parts of a question should be answered consecutively. Each answer should start from a fresh page.

Q.1 An Indian state located in the Western part of the country has a long border line with a neighbouring
country. Economy of this State depends mostly upon tourism, knowledge-services and handicrafts.
Although increasingly progressive, this state is also characterized by its low literacy rate, inadequate rural
transport infrastructure, minimal educational infrastructure and poor rural health services. If you are asked to
formulate a pervasive computing solution that could allow an early diagnosis of the most common medical
problems of this rural population using a proper combination of several devices and services, without
usually requiring it to go to hospitals far away from their locale, what would you advise and why? (Hint:
Please consider making simplifying assumptions and identifying the candidate features before working out
the rest of the solution in terms of hardware, software and services.) [2 + 4 + 4 = 10]

Q.2 What shall happen if:

2.1. Priority Inversion issue is not tackled appropriately in a system required to handle hard real-time
application services.
2.2. Support for user-space device drivers is removed from the WinCE 6 architecture. [2 X 5 = 10]

Q.3 Please answer the following with due reasoning:

3.1. Significant issues involved in Context-aware Computing system design include those related to
handling of heterogeneous sensors with uncertainty and conflicts (sensor fusion), choice of data
versus sensor networks and choices related to making mobile devices location-aware. Why?
3.2. Wearable and Pervasive Computing paradigms complement each-other. However, it is entirely
possible that a real-life solution may involve both. How?
3.3. Is it true that in Mobile IPv6-enabled systems, Mobile node / host is always addressable at its home
address, whether away from home or currently attached to its home link? Why? (Please do NOT
answer ‘how’ it is done!) [4 + 3 + 3 = 10]

Q.4 Identify the candidate elements of hardware / software / firmware / communication / protocols which should
assist the targeted users in the following case. Please justify each of your choices in brief.

4.1. A pervasive computing solution that could allow tourists / journalists visiting places of historical
importance to tag relevant details / write annotations / draw sketches that they may wish on the
walls and objects of those monuments --- all without actually disfiguring the monuments and objects
therein, without using any physical means to actually draw / itch / write and without using any
physical ink / paint etc.
4.2. A pervasive computing solution that could allow a personincapable of standing on his feet due to a
temporary disability to be able to get a customisable virtual walkthrough inside a forest, plant or
building --- all without knowing how to operate a computer through keyboard or mouse. The user
should be able to see any object therein from any viewing angle and / or on-spot location he
chooses right from his arm chair. [5 + 5 = 10]

Q.5 In the context of an Pervasive Computing system, which of the following are true or false? Please provide
brief justification in each case. (Please note that merely mentioning TRUE or FALSE shall earn no marks.)
(a) Transcoding is not suited to structured documents written in mark-up languages.
(b) Device-Specific Content Generation doesnnot involve post-processing of Server-generated web-
based content and can happen at Application Servers (full or selective)as well as Application
Proxies (full) although former is a better choice in most cases.
(c) When a web service changes (e.g., adds a parameter to its method), the program using it breaks.
(d) XML is a text-based protocol that is used to access a web service but there are many other choices
available which do allow such access.
(e) In case of Light Emitting Polymer displays, in order to generate light with these materials, a thin
film of non-conducting polymer is deposited on a glass or plastic substrate and sandwiched
between two electrodes. [5 x 2 = 10]
SS ZG531 (EC-2 Regular) Second Semester 2008-2009 Page 2

Q.6 Suggest a simple yet effective pervasive computing design for building a single storied, four-bedroom Smart
House (with a kitchen, a living room, a lawn and a garage) in a residential colony situated in a semi-rural
area by making good use of appropriate technology choices in terms of hardware elements, software
elements, communication elements, corresponding protocols and services.

Please do take into account the ground realities of the locale and the power-supply issues in this part of the
world apart from living patterns of a typical Indian family. Write your assumptions before you begin solving
the problem.

The concept of the smart house has attracted much interest over the years with emphasis on the sensors to be
used and their functionality. The choice of sensor is very important because they are added to the home
environment and may not be very welcome.

Much investigation has been carried out into the development and use of simple sensors for detecting binary
events such as off/on, present/not present etc. These are the typical sensors used in burglar alarms and easily
obtainable at low cost, such as reed switches, pressure pads and infra red activity sensors.

RFID tags on objects such as cups and a reader worn on the wrist enables determination of a person
interacting closely with devices.

Ultrasonic sensors enable highly reliable determination of the location of the occupant.

In the computer vision community, the use of cameras has been investigated for smart house applications
and the related application area of surveillance for which one or more people need to be tracked in large
spaces. The large number can also be prohibitively costly.

The experiments show that virtual sensors can be used to detect activities such as being near, passing or
using a device in a smart house but better image processing algorithms, especially background subtraction,
are required to reduce the number of false alarms produced.

A key application of sensor networks in smart environments is in monitoring activities of people. There may
exist several scenarios in which different kinds of sensors can be used including ultrasonic sensors are used
for monitoring of patients and the elderly. The initial results are quite promising, and show the potential
usability of ultrasonic sensors in monitoring indoor movements of people, and in capturing and classifying
trajectories.

A Smart House in Denmark connects sensors and lighting using wired communication technology. The
original concept of Carlo Gavazzi (shown above in the picture) consisted of several types of sensors: inside
and outside motion detectors, smoke detectors, water leakage detectors, and thermometers. The input from
these sensors can be used to alert the owner or control house lightning. In addition to having the light
controlled by sensors it can also be controlled remotely and set to different intensity levels. For instance all
light in a house can be switched off by pressing a single switch when leaving the house. [10]

********
The concept of the smart house has attracted much interest over the years with emphasis on the
sensors to be used and their functionality. The choice of sensor is very important because they
are added to the home environment and may not be very welcome.

Much investigation has been carried out into the development and use of simple sensors for
detecting binary events such as off/on, present/not present etc. These are the typical sensors
used in burglar alarms and easily obtainable at low cost, such as reed switches, pressure pads
and infra red activity sensors.

RFID tags on objects such as cups and a reader worn on the wrist enables determination of a
person interacting closely with devices.

Ultrasonic sensors enable highly reliable determination of the location of the occupant.

In the computer vision community, the use of cameras has been investigated for smart house
applications and the related application area of surveillance for which one or more people need
to be tracked in large spaces. The large number can also be prohibitively costly.

The experiments show that virtual sensors can be used to detect activities such as being near,
passing or using a device in a smart house but better image processing algorithms, especially
background subtraction, are required to reduce the number of false alarms produced.

A key application of sensor networks in smart environments is in monitoring activities of

people. There may exist several scenarios in which different kinds of sensors can be used
including ultrasonic sensors are used for monitoring of patients and the elderly. The initial
results are quite promising, and show the potential usability of ultrasonic sensors in monitoring
indoor movements of people, and in capturing and classifying trajectories.

A Smart House in Denmark connects sensors and lighting using wired communication
technology. The original concept of Carlo Gavazzi (shown above in the picture) consisted of
several types of sensors: inside and outside motion detectors, smoke detectors, water leakage
detectors, and thermometers. The input from these sensors can be used to alert the owner or
control house lightning. In addition to having the light controlled by sensors it can also be
controlled remotely and set to different intensity levels. For instance all light in a house can be
switched off by pressing a single switch when leaving the house.