CSR: Small: Project T: Enabling Open Innovation in Mobile Platforms through API Virtualization

开放是创新的钥匙。计算机科学和其他学科的许多领域都接受了开放，并见证了新技术进步的爆炸式增长。该提案认为，移动平台（如Android和iOS）也需要拥抱开放性。这是因为目前的移动平台大多是封闭的，不允许第三方创新，这使得引入颠覆性技术变得极其困难。这一点可以通过最开放的手机平台Android来观察。Android被认为是一个开放的平台，因为它的源代码是开放的。然而，从开放式创新的角度来看，它确实是一个封闭的平台；这是因为一个小的、独立的第三方没有简单的方法来修改平台，并将修改大规模地分发给最终用户。只有谷歌和三星等少数公司有能力修改平台并交付。认识到这样的问题，该项目提出了一种称为API虚拟化的新技术，可以在移动平台上实现开放式创新。API虚拟化允许第三方开发人员修改、重新实现或自定义平台API，并无缝地部署修改。该技术的独特之处在于，它允许完全在应用程序层进行修改，而不需要任何平台级更改。这允许了实际的开放性——第三方可以很容易地发布他们对平台的修改，而不需要更新整个平台。如果成功，该项目将产生(1)在Android上实现API虚拟化的工作原型，(2)利用API虚拟化并提供更好功能（如应用匿名、自动移动云集成和能源政策定制）的几个案例研究系统，以及(3)第三方开发人员上传其平台API修改的Web服务，最终用户可以下载和使用。

Openness is a key to innovation. Numerous areas in computer science and other disciplines have embraced openness and witnessed an explosion of new technological advances. This proposal argues that mobile platforms (such as Android and iOS) need to embrace openness as well. This is motivated by the fact that the current mobile platforms are mostly closed and do not allow third-party innovation, making it extremely difficult to introduce disruptive technologies. This can be observed easily by examining the most open mobile platform, Android. Android is regarded as an open platform since its source code is open. However, it is indeed a closed platform from the perspective of open innovation; this is because a small, independent third party has no easy way to modify the platform and distribute the modification at a large scale to end users. Only a select few, such as Google and Samsung, have the power to modify the platform and deliver it.Recognizing such a problem, this project proposes a new technique called API virtualization that enables open innovation in mobile platforms. API virtualization allows third-party developers to modify, reimplement, or customize platform APIs and deploy the modifications seamlessly. The uniqueness of the proposed technique is that it enables modifications completely at the app layer without requiring any platform-level changes. This allows practical openness---third parties can easily distribute their modifications for a platform without the need to update the entire platform.If successful, this project will produce (1) a working prototype that implements API virtualization on Android, (2) several case-study systems that leverage API virtualization and provide better functionality such as app anonymity, automatic mobile-cloud integration, and energy policy customization, and (3) a Web service where third-party developers upload their platform API modifications that end users can download and use.