WEMON: An Integrated Mobile and Web-based Environment which ...

WEMON: An Integrated Mobile and Web-based Environment which adds Value and Interoperability in the Push Services. D. KAROLIDIS, A. PAPADAKIS, P. PRENTAKIS, M. SAMARAKOU Department of Energy Technology Technological Educational Institution of Athens 17, Ag. Spyridonos Egaleo, GR12210 GREECE {karolidis, papadakis, prentakis, marsam}@teiath.gr http//www.et.teiath.gr

Abstract: - The Web Mobile Notification platform (WEMON) is a web-based environment for automatic SMS notification. It leverages the integration of the mobile telecommunications with the information technology in the context of push services. In a push service the user is interested in future events and when these take place, pertinent content is sent (pushed) to the end-user. The platform can be customized for the development of services or used as a middleware component in a distributed environment. It supports communication with external content providers, based on a web services API. The content description is based on the MPEG7 standardized metadata approach. Additional features include the device awareness, the intelligent content delivery and a framework for content adaptation. The main features include its lightweight nature of the component and the programming hooks it offers. The paper describes in detail the specification and the development of the WEMON platform. Key-Words: - web-based environment, metadata, SMS notification, open-source, middleware, web services

1 Introduction The mobile telephone has been a significant factor in the evolution of communication systems. One of the largest growth areas in communication is the Short Message Service (SMS) or text messaging as it is more popularly known [1, 2]. The most popular mobile application, Short Message Service (SMS), attracted 580 million users who sent 431 billion messages in 2002 [3]. In the first quarter of 2004 users sent 135 billion SMS messages [4] and predictions are that 94.9 million mobile commerce users in 2003 will grow to 1.67 billion users by 2008 [5]. SMS will account for the bulk of mobile telephone companies revenues from data services until 2006 [6, 7]. This high diffusion of SMS facilitates analyzing usage behaviour and hints at the commercial potential of future communication services. Multimedia Messaging Services (MMS), for example, is building on the success of SMS [8] and allows for richer content based on similar asynchronous, digital and interactive communication. According to the above, there is much room for the introduction of the SMS and in general the push services in versatile environments. These environments can pertain to business and organizations that request a direct and ubiquitous way to notify and communicate with their

employees, entertainment such as TV channels that may want to offer personalized services or even the home environment where the end user wants to set his alerts and notifications. In the context of these needs and taking into account the momentum of the mobile evolution, this paper presents a complete architecture of the push service components. These components compose a middleware that can be used as an infrastructure in a generic service provision architecture. Short Message – based Communication Services. They are 2-way services that support marketing campaigns and mobile advertising including mobile vote, competition, mobile information channel, sweepstake, quiz and download of ring tones and images. The automatic SMS exchange takes place with the use of specialized software protocols and applications [9]. The system architecture is based on the communication with a specialized SMS Center, which usually resides at the premises of the network operator. The communication is based on the binary SMPP (Short Message Peer to Peer) protocol implemented in the Gateways. The characteristics of such services include the maximum sending rate, the period of validity of the message, the delivery notification report, the

multiple access interfaces (HTTP - HyperText Transfer Protocol, SMTP - Simple Mail Transfer Protocol, Web, TCP/IP - Transmission Control Protocol/Internet Protocol). Other features include the real-time, web-based monitoring, the management of different application-level parameters and the access to detailed statistical elements (hits, participants, new participants). Advantages of SMS Communication Services. The enterprises are realising that the speed and the low cost of sending an SMS message create a convenient and trustworthy way of communication with the employees, the customers and their partners. They can take advantage of this direct and bidirectional communication and provide news notification, remind events/obligations (alerts), create communities, perform competition, and create interactive dialogue with the customers and their collaborators. Specific advantages include, • Quick communication: the telecommunications networks deliver the messages almost instantaneously. • Reliable communication: the message is (almost) always being received. The SMS technology supports the proof of receipt of the message. • Bidirectional communication: it allows the recipient to reply. • Worldwide coverage: the SMS service is supported by every GSM network around the world. • Industry standard: the SMS protocol has been adopted by all the enterprises, and particularly by the mass media. Push Applications. Several recent efforts have been proposed to address the issue of incorporating SMS capabilities for the remote monitoring, control of automation systems and automatic notification. OPC (Object Linking and Embedding for Process Control) [10] is a platform that integrates IP networks with the Short Message Service (SMS), in order to deliver an integrated service for access to data sources conforming to Object Linking and Embedding for Process Control (OPC) standard specifications, through SMS-enabled mobile devices. The gateway supports pull and push services in order to support both request-based and alarm / scheduled - based notifications, respectively. The capability of accessing different types of OPC data sources (real-time and historical)

by any SMS-enabled device consists of a highly flexible service, supporting mobility and eventbased notification. Furthermore, predefined events can cause notification alarms which are forwarded in the form of SMS messages to a mobile operator. This approach fits into low cost applications with minor requirements regarding expandability and functionality [11, 12]. A System integration of WAP and SMS for home network system is responding to remote queries, the managed devices (e.g. home appliances or burglar alarm system) can actively sent alerting messages to a mobile terminal (laptop or phone) when an abnormal state occurs [13]. Viral effects exemplify transforming attention into action. Other intended consumer reactions to mobile advertising messages include following a link to a Web page, e-mailing the advertiser, purchasing a product, and placing a telephone call [14]. Compared to click-through rates of less than 1% for Web-based advertising [15], average click and call-through rates for wireless devices are 19% and 12%, respectively. Well-targeted campaigns in Japan achieved click-through rates up to 33% [16]. Experts predicted a higher usage of mobile coupons – stored in the mobile phone’s memory and therefore difficult to misplace or forget – compared to their paper-based equivalents [17]. Mobile coupons have at least three advantages: targeting based on mobile phone numbers, time sensitivity (e.g., receiving a 20% discount on purchases upon entering a shop), and efficient handling by scanning the coupon’ s bar code at the point of sale. In a Customer Relationship Management system, customers can receive free newsletters, pictures, ring tones, bonus points or coupons after joining a loyalty program. One expert, a mobile phone operator, plans to send clients SMS information on where to get the cheapest pre-paid phone cards when their credits run low. Sending SMS reminders to clients who fail to pay bills on time is another application popular with the interviewees. In Systems with Entertainment services, half of the experts noted that most people have a natural playfulness and therefore providing games and prizes via text messaging yields high participation and helps attract and keep customers. Research suggests that entertainment applications enhance customer loyalty among the ‘‘generation @’’ – young Internet users between 12 and 16 years old [18].

An emerging application may have to do with real-time confirmation of purchases. The credit card companies may send information when they charge their users’ accounts, both for notification and confirmation. According to the aforementioned use-cases, the notification utilities can be used in a wide variety of systems, varying from industrial control systems to entertainment-related content provision. Currently the notification is performed in a proprietary way, re-inventing the wheel in certain cases. The next step could be to regard this functionality more as a value-adding utility than an autonomous system. The development in this area is expected to deal with the development of component - based infrastructures, supporting multiple notification and messaging channels such as SMS, MMS, email, or even ICQ and MSN. Such infrastructure can be provided as a building block to versatile services and systems. WEMON is as an off-the-shelf package, pluggable in heterogeneous architectures.

external resources i.e. the connection to an SMS Centre.

Our Objective. To this direction we have defined the basic components of an automatic notification system and provided the functionality in an interoperable manner. We did not focus on the provision of a standalone, monolithic application, a task efficiently undertaken in the market, but have built a modular, notification platform. WEMON targets types of clients and services where interactivity is taken into account. In the event-initiated or Push mechanism the user registers to the service and chooses some notification-events that interest him. When such an event takes place, the content production environment notifies the service, which in turn informs the user. When the user is informed he can attempt to retrieve more information and the service evolves to a pull or user-initiated scenario (based primarily on browsing). Such a case is the WAP push services which emerge from the convergence of Push and Pull. WEMON consists of a subsystem for event inserting, user profile management, and finally the SMS and MMS notification. Each user has a profile, where he inserts his personal details and configures the service. When the selected events take place the user is dynamically notified. The implemented system uses reliable opensource components and commercial tools. Unlike the majority of the commercial, high-volume SMS services, our prototype system is lightweight, standalone and off-the-shelf without necessitating

Fig. 1. The architecture of model

2 System Description WEMON is a web-based system that allows the online notification of events, to a dynamic list of recipients via SMS and MMS with dynamic content.

The system can cover any event category (e.g. athletics, TV schedule, alerts for unexpected events in the home or in the library environment, specific business needs e.g. communication with travelling employees in the case of the MMS). There are three categories of users: • The system administrator: he is in charge of all the system. He deals with the system parameterization, operation check and statistics reception, installation and maintenance of the network gate. • The content administrator: he deals with the content import, management and event activation. • The final user: he is interested in specific events and he gets notified of them. He manages his profile and interests. The basic operations include: • User registration • User login and preferences • Code access management • Event and content management • Notification composition and delivery User Registration. In order to achieve a certain level of personalization, the user details are stored. • The user registers with a username and an access code with a specific format. The access

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code is encoded, for safety reasons, using a one-way hash function. At the time of the registration, the user gives his/her personal details including name, surname, the email address and necessarily the mobile telephone number (which is used for the notification). The user can explicitly disconnect and there also is a timeout mechanism.

Events and content management. WEMON registers future events, on behalf of the content providers or the system administrator and retrieves notification when they take place. The usual operations include: • The content administrators can add, edit and delete events and sub-events. He also provides dynamically the notification text when the event takes place. • The users can inspect the available events, determining the ones of which they wish to receive notification • The event details (which may include details of sub-events and it may be offered in multiple views) are stored. • The system automatically logs the notifications. Apart from the above operations, a significant question emerges. It has been mentioned that the events and subsequent content sources can be heterogeneous. The information sources can include audiovisual environments (TV channels, newspapers), telecommunications (news services provided by telcos or as added-value services), elearning (periodic posting, word-quiz of the day services). Such information sources differ not only in their business model but the way they handle and offer their data. High-level semantic for event and content description. WEMON needs a uniform approach to handle these content and notification sources. Such an approach can be achieved using the XML [19]. The Extensible Markup Language is the standardized way for exchanging structured information. Unlike the HTML, which is used for presentation purposes and has a standard set of tags, the XML can accommodate any set of tags. This would lead to a chaotic situation, if anyone could define his own set of tags. What is practically happening is the specification for vertical areas of XML semantics and schemas, which capture the relative conventions and formalisms in these knowledge areas.

In the wide area of event and content management, a generic approach (not being limited in a specific target areas e.g. the news services) can fully cover the WEMON (current and future) needs. The idea of developing a new description schema would be practically inapplicable because it would not be standard-based. For this reason, we have decided to borrow a certain set of description elements of the prevalent standard in this area. The MPEG-7 set of standards [20], formally named “Multimedia Content Description Interface”. This is a standard for describing the multimedia content data that supports some degree of interpretation of the information meaning, which can be passed onto, or accessed by, a device or a computer code. MPEG-7 is not aimed at any one application in particular; rather, the elements that MPEG-7 standardizes support as broad a range of applications as possible. The WEMON content description engine is MPEG7-enabled. The modular nature of the standard allows us to use a certain sub-set of the description elements, those that are useful for the communication between WEMON and the external event and content providers, in an agreed, predefined way. Each content item is accompanied with metadata and this metadata is expressed in XML using the MPEG7 schema. This metadata consists of information, such as the classification scheme for each content item (i.e. the content category to which it belongs) and the key words that characterize it. This kind of information is used directly to notify efficiently the end-user. In the case of the MMS notification, which can be accompanied with an image or a clip, there is also information on the quality of each clip including the data rate, the resolution, the format etc. This information combined with the device awareness can lead to intelligent content delivery decisions. Device awareness. In its initial release WEMON has supported the SMS-based notification. This has been extended to support the MMS (Multimedia Messaging Service) case, which offers more capabilities. However, in the case of MMS the case is not so straightforward as the case of SMS. While in the case of the simple SMS the notification is simple character text, in the case of the MMS the situation is more complicated. The MMS, with a maximum of approximately 100 KB (depending on the mobile operator) can contain images, sound and clips. A specific mobile phone, however powerful it may be, it cannot support all possible formats. The

concept of an open, underlying platform (the Operating System of the mobile phone), which can accommodate multiple decodes and media players is gaining momentum, but at this stage its applicability is limited. If the WEMON platform could recognize the device it would also be aware of the device characteristics such as display, memory, video player etc. It would also know the supported set of formats. To this end the system allows the end-user to register his device. In the mobile world, this is an efficient solution since the capabilities of cell phones are rarely changing during their lifetime. E.g. it is difficult to change the processor or the display (however it is becoming common to install new decoders). The system knowing the brand and model of the mobile phone can make some “intelligent” solutions such as sending the appropriate version of an image in the MMS, e.g. in the JPEG format which can be readily viewed at this model.

logical step is to adapt the available content to the specific needs. E.g. when an event takes place the content provider notifies the WEMON platform and offers some content to be delivered to the end users. This content can be an arbitrary audio file. This can be transformed to MP3 encoding and then it can be sent to a cell phone. In the case of images and audio files there multiple available tools, some of them free. On the other hand, in the case of video clips the tools are usually commercial, e.g. PacketVideo encoder [21].

2.1 Use cases The use cases include: a. User registration: The user provides personal details including the username and his password. He is informed of the successful registration and at any time he can alter his details. b. User authentication: The user (content administrator or end user) provides his username and password and he is authenticated. c. Interest selection and arming: The user selects his interesting events. He has already made registration in the system and he is authenticated. d. Content management: The content administrator has already logged in. He can add new events or manage the existing ones, changing their status and activating the process of users’ notification. The use cases are depicted in the following diagram.

Fig. 2. Notification and content flow The capabilities offered by the device recognition are limitless for a tailored multimedia content offering. But the system depends on the availability of multiple content versions. Content Adaptation. With the recognition of the mobile device and its capabilities, the platform can choose the most appropriate content. The next

Fig. 3. The Use Cases

2.2 Main Features of the system The application supports the dynamic creation of the content, the list of the recipients and the parameterized events. The system consists of the following components The notification insertion and content provision module. The event generator connects to WEMON and asynchronously inserts and configures the events. These can extend from alarms in the home environment, to sports events, or even emergent situation in a location-based manner (accompanied with GPS functionality). As aforementioned the notification insertion is based on the metadata management. Each new future event is accompanied with a high-level semantic description. This description is parsed and the event is handled appropriately. Then it is placed in the corresponding category and its description is offered to the end user via the web site environment. The event handling utility. This provides hooks to the notification server. WEMON can handle multiple event resources. The event handle utility is responsible for getting notified of an event by the content provider, retrieving the corresponding content and then delivering it to the interested end-users. This relatime interaction presupposes communication and close collaboration between two or more components independent of each other, most probably developed and managed by different vendors. Two basic cases include the Java and the Windows (Microsoft) worlds. An interoperable approach is needed. The Web Services support a distributed computing environment, which offer implementation transparency. Web services applications. Web services and the interaction between Windows and Java become more and more present in the industrial world to build an efficient, more product-oriented implementation. The communication between the WEMON platform and the content provider is based, in the typical case, on web services. The two systems (MOBINE and the content providers) are not in the general case tightlycoupled so the communication should be based on a flexible and extensible mechanism. The WEMON acts as a WS server, offering a set of methods in a

published API. It waits for the triggering, when new events/ content is available. The choice of SOAP-based Web Services is not mandatory for the communication between WEMON and the content provider. Other programming models can be used as well. For example if both systems are Java-based, Remote Method Invocation (RMI) can also be employed. The actual transfer of the content can be performed over File Tranfer Protocol (FTP) or HTTP. In our approach the FTP server is accommodated in the WEMON platform and the content provider can access it (in a safe manner) and upload content. The components presented in our paper can operate as a server or a pluggable package. The implementation has proceeded in an onion-like manner. When interoperability is requested the Web Service - based layer is present offering remote access and implementation transparency. In a local, self-package environment the implementation can be lightweight, offering direct access to the functionality.

3 Implementation 3.1 Components The flow chart of the platform is depicted in the following figure.

Fig. 4. Flow Chart of Application. A functional module has been created for each of the above components. Functionality has been also implemented for: • The control of the identity of the user • The storage of the events, elements of events and their retraction • The connections to the Database • The exit from the system

Data Handling. The database schema includes the user details and preferences, the event information, and the notifications. A user can be interested in multiple events while many users can be interested in the same event. An event element can take place through many actions (e.g. Goal in the case of football game can be achieved with HEAD, SHOT e.t.c.). Finally, an event element can take place many times for the same event. The following six tables are used: • The table users includes the personal elements of the users. • The table actions includes the details of actions regarding the events. • The table events includes the description of events. • The table subevents includes the specific details of events. • The table interests includes the future events that interest the users. • Finally, the table notifications includes all the messages that have been sent.

3.2 Tools As aforementioned we have attempted to base the WEMON platform on available tools and to build on established programming techniques. The overall component architecture is depicted in the following figure.

Fig. 5. Overall component architecture. The basic sets of features include the look and feel, the scripting support, the core service logic, the notification utility and the data persistence. 3.2.1 Look and Feel The overall look and feel of WEMON is based on the standardized approach of the Cascading Style Sheets (CSS). This facilitates the management and the configuration of the front end, on a per-page level.

A basic choice that has been followed since the beginning of the project has been to allow access from the maximum number of client devices. The usage of xHTML, which is an XML-based mark-up language, provides uniform accessibility through the majority of handheld devices, including cell phones and PDAs. Apache. Apache is based on open source multiplatform web server. Apache has been the most popular web server on the internet [22]. During the project the Apache server has been used, on which the PHP and JavaScript code is executed. 3.2.2 Scripting and interactivity PHP. PHP (Hypertext Preprocessor) is a widely used, open code, generally aimed scripting language of planning-programming [23]. It is suitable for the development of applications for the Web and can be incorporated into HTML. The code is executed in the server. In the present work the PHP code has been used to gather data and produce the dynamic content of pages. The PHP code implements the service logic that executes in the apache web server. The registration, the connection, and the user profile management functionality, have been written in PHP, with the form of functions files. JavaScript. JavaScript is a scripting language that offers interactivity in the web pages. The JavaScript code is written in an ASCII form-code text and incorporated into the code of HTML. JavaScript provides support for multilateral documents with frames, reloading of a part of the window and documents with interaction [24]. JavaScript has been mainly used for the opening and closure of secondary windows (Help), for the implementation of actions corresponding to a concrete event (reception and loss of focus of the object) and for specific calculations. 3.2.3 Core Logic WEMON message handling engine should be characterized by flexibility and extensibility. This engine is shouldering the main work load and it has to be based on a reliable infrastructure. To this end we have chosen the Java platform and specifically the EJB paradigm, which ideally suits a component-based platform such as WEMON. The underlying platform which has been used is the open-source JBoss Application server [25], which accommodates the service logic. The basic service logic which orchestrates the operations of receiving the events, parsing the

descriptions, finding the interested users, composing the messages and delivering them to the notification servers (the SMS – MMS Gateway) is based on Enterprise Java Beans. The messaging-building utilities are based on Message Driven Beans (MDB), which are designed for purposes like that. This way WEMON exploits off-the-shelf functionality, offered by the Java platform. A significant example is the reliable transaction management. This ensures that, in the case of a problem e.g. a black out, the notification procedure will be completed when the server reboots. 3.2.5 Notification utility The NowSMS Gateway is a tool for the development of SMS Push applications [26]. The gateway supports the transmission of SMS via one or more GSM modems (or GSM telephones that are connected through a serial or a USB port in a PC), or above TCP/IP connections using SMPP (Short Message Peer to Peer) [27], UCP/EMI (Universal Computer Protocol/ External Machine Interface) and/or HTTP protocols. It supports Unicode formats (UTF-8), allowing the extension to multilingual environments. It has been used in the application for sending SMS message. 3.2.5 Data Persistence MySQL is an open source RDBMS (Relational Database Management System). MySQL has been used to provide data persistence. In the PHP code the SQL commands have been executed, for the access and the changes of elements of the database.

3.3 Platform Validation To test the adequacy of the technical solution we have deployed a pilot interactive mobile application. This allowed us to evaluate the performance of the system, measuring the system limits both in terms of simultaneous users, amount of information sent/received, scalability. The Test Pilot has been deployed in a mocked live environment and implied the simultaneous use of multiple streams. We have focused on sports events and specifically football. The future events refer to predefined, forthcoming football matches. The user has at his disposal details such as the name of the team and the team players for configuring his interests.

For each event, WEMON (in communication with the content providers) offers to the users parametric fields including the event elements (e.g. GOAL, SUBSTITUTION, YELLOW CARD etc.) and the actions (e.g. for the GOAL we have as actions the: HEADSTRIKE, DISTANT SHOT, PENALTY etc.).

3.4 Operations In the following the Graphical User Interface of WEMON is presented. The system is Unicode – enabled, supporting multi languages – the Greek version is presented herein.

Login

Events User Registration

Fig. 6. Home page The user accesses the home page and after inserting his credentials, he can manage his profile or access the list of available events. There are two kinds of users, either the content provider, who is presented with enhanced features, or the end-user, who can handle his profile and the events of interest. In the case of the content provider, the contextsensitive GUI forwards him to the content – administration page. Edit, delete and manage Event

New Event Insertion

Fig. 7. Content administrator interface The content administrator manages the events and the sub-events, inserting new or updating the existing ones. When an event takes place the content provider configures the notification messages and inserts the pertinent text. The list of the interested recipients is automatically populated based on the user

preference data. The notification utility can be triggered manually or it can be configured automatically (taking into account the potential delay – latency, e.g. in sports events).

The notification hooks are checked and the contact details (email, mobile phone numbers) of the users that are eligible for notification are checked. This is based on a RDBMS query.

Fig. 8. Event management

Concurrent execution of service instances. WEMON is executing real-time applications, where extensibility is crucial. The service execution environment is based on the Enterprise Java Beans (EJB) paradigm. The execution is based on stateless EJBs; the container instantiates a configurable number of beans in order to serve all the requests. The off-the-shelf functionality of the platform (JBoss) allows for an optimal execution in terms of performance. Furthermore the execution of multiple services at once can be supported. The multi-threading functionality is also provided by the Application Server in an optimal way.

The end-user is presented with a user-friendly interface, where he can set his preferences and the interesting events. He may also configure the notification preferences (e.g. text only, link, WAP message).

Supported formats. The core WEMON engine is agnostic of the content format and versions – any new format can be accommodated and the content can have multiple versions.

SMS Sending

5 Conclusions Edit, delete and manage Event User Interests Insertion

The system development followed the basic conventions in web-based application development towards usability, security, user-friendliness and an open architecture. The system is simple and easy to maintain. The overall architecture has been primarily based on open source tools. Advances

have been numerous and very fruitful even if some big technical hurdles were to be beaten. Fig. 9. End-User interface

4 System Metrics In this section we discuss some performance related issues. Delay between event and availability of clip. Different factors influence this delay such as the video encoding and the content uploading. The network connection is expected to be fast in order to minimize the transfer delay. When the content is received, it is categorized and classified. These procedures are based on the content metadata. The metadata section points to the specific category that the resource should be placed. The overall procedure is automatic and the delay is minimal, depending on the hardware and software capabilities.

Contrary to the commercial systems that are offered as monolithic applications, our WEMON platform has been a multi-tier architecture. It has been built upon the concept of the framework, which accommodates the components implementing the necessary functionality. We have leveraged the well-defined, standard-based functionality of each component, in order to achieve implementation transparency. Furthermore the requirements and a basic structure of the data, relative to this family of services have been described as well as the workflow and the functionality. One important aspect of the platform is its standalone nature. It can operate in a minimal configuration consisting of a server (PC-based) connected with an ordinary mobile phone (i.e. no expensive and cumbersome connections to external

Notification Centers or other components are needed) Our work demonstrates in a simple but concrete manner, how using basic components a powerful push architecture has been built and how it can be enhanced. Critical points in such architecture are the following • The notification volume that can be served (SMS per minute) • The metadata that accompany the content and allow the user to easily choose the interests and arm the notification events • The latency of the system in the case of an event firing–how quickly the system reacts when an event is available • How easy it is for the content provider to provide content and the notification events, probably in a programmatic environment • The monitoring and management of the system

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The system can be extended using other notification channels, not necessarily wireless such as email, ICQ and MSN.

[13]

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