Towards Dynamic and Heterogeneous Social IoT Environments

Abstract

Nowadays, there are millions of smart devices connected to the Internet. The purpose of these devices is to make people's lives easier. Thanks to the collaboration among them, the possibilities that the Internet of Things brings can grow exponentially. However, many manufacturers develop closed protocols and devices to protect their market share, limiting in many aspects this collaboration. This not only limits the ability of devices from different manufacturers to collaborate but also inevitably leads to the well-known vendor lock-in problem. This phenomenon implies that, if maximum benefit is to be derived from the IoT, devices from the same vendor must be purchased to ensure maximum compatibility. This paper proposes a solution whose purpose is to promote proactivity and collaboration between heterogeneous devices. Therefore, smart devices will be aware of the environmental situation they are in and the contextual properties that will allow them to adapt their behavior. To this end, a conceptual architecture is presented that favors integration between IoT devices regardless of the protocols developed by their manufacturers and facilitates the description of information through a common data model. This architecture has been evaluated in real and simulated environments to validate its feasibility and efficiency. As a result, devices from different manufacturers can communicate to create collaborative and heterogeneous environments in a simple, efficient, and affordable way.