CSR: Medium: Mobile Distributed Computing in the Cloud

该项目研究云计算如何支持移动分布式计算，用户的移动设备相互交互，为移动计算和传感提供广泛的协作应用。代理是云中的每个用户软件实体，它代表用户的移动设备。代理具有比移动设备更大的存储容量、更高的计算能力、更宽的带宽和更好的可用性。他们是全天候可用的，即使他们的移动设备由于连接不良或被关闭而离线。该项目支持的应用程序在医疗保健、安全或社会互动等领域为社会带来了巨大的好处。例如，移动分布式应用程序将允许用户或卫生机构在早期阶段监测和阻止流行病的传播。用户移动设备和代理可以进行区域协作，以做出本地化决策，以改进可伸缩性和隐私性。除了更大的社会效益外，该项目还使许多参与研究、开发和测试的传统上得不到充分服务的校园学生群体受益。这个项目的基本成果被纳入了一个新的研究生课程移动云计算。利用现有的高中生科学技术教育计划，为高中生开设了一门新的移动应用程序编程课程。该项目的目的是设计、构建和研究一个移动云系统架构，为移动用户提供有效和高效的协作应用程序。该项目有望取得的新研究成果有：(1)编程模型和中间件，能够在移动设备和代理设备的组合上有效执行分布式应用程序；(2)自动和动态应用划分技术，在移动设备和代理之间划分应用；(3)执行代理管理的云服务：代理虚拟机映像的可扩展存储、代理请求协同调度和移动数据的存储管理；(4)隐私保护协议，利用额外的云提供商来保证增强的用户数据隐私水平，同时保持非私有协议中实现的大部分功能；(5)使用代理云和Android手机/平板电脑的原型；(6)一组具有代表性的应用。原型和应用程序将在大规模的用户研究中进行测试。为了促进结果的传播，代理源代码将公开提供。此外，来自工业实验室的研究人员被邀请参加校园举办的研讨会，以鼓励合作和寻求技术转让机会。

This project investigates how cloud computing can support mobile distributed computing, in which users' mobile devices interact with each other to provide a large spectrum of collaborative applications for mobile computing and sensing. A surrogate is a per-user software entity in the cloud that acts on behalf of the user's mobile devices. Surrogates have larger storage capacity, higher compute power, wider bandwidth, and better availability than mobile devices. They are available 24x7, even when their mobile devices are offline because of poor connectivity or simply turned off. The applications enabled by this project have a substantial benefit for society in areas such as healthcare, safety, or social interaction. For example, a mobile distributed application would allow users or health agencies to monitor and stop, in early stages, the spread of epidemic diseases. The user mobile devices and surrogates may collaborate regionally to make localized decisions for improved scalability and privacy. In addition to the larger societal benefits, this project benefits many traditionally under-served student groups on campus which are involved in research, development, and testing. The foundational results of this project are incorporated into a new graduate course on Mobile Cloud Computing. A new course on Mobile Application Programming is offered to high school students by leveraging an existing program for educating high school students in science and technology.The aim of this project is to design, build, and study a mobile-cloud system architecture that enables effective and efficient collaborative applications for mobile users. The novel research outcomes expected from this project are: (1) a programming model and a middleware that enable effective execution of distributed applications on a combination of mobile devices and surrogates; (2) automatic and dynamic application partitioning techniques to divide the application between the mobile devices and the surrogate; (3) cloud services that perform surrogate management: scalable storage for surrogate virtual machine images, surrogate request co-scheduling, and storage management for mobile data; (4) privacy-preserving protocols that leverage additional cloud providers to guarantee an enhanced level of user data privacy, while maintaining most of the functionality achieved in the non-private protocols; (5) a prototype using an surrogate cloud and Android phones/tablets; and (6) a set of representative applications. The prototype and applications will be tested in a large scale user study. To spur the dissemination of results, the surrogate source code will be made publicly available. Furthermore, researchers from industry labs are invited to workshops organized on campus to encourage collaboration and seek technology transfer opportunities.