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Whiskers

Friday, March 11, 2016 - 12:49 by Steve Liang
This proposal is in the Project Proposal Phase (as defined in the Eclipse Development Process) and is written to declare its intent and scope. We solicit additional participation and input from the community. Please login and add your feedback in the comments section.
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Background

The Internet of Things (IoT) needs no introduction: it is a widely-held view that billions of devices will be part of the Internet of Things in just a few short years. Yet, while this explosion of devices represents boundless opportunity for innovation, this ascendancy also presents daunting challenges such as fragmentation, vendor lock-in and the proliferation of information silos. The OGC (Open Geospatial Consortium) SensorThings API is an OGC standard that allows IoT devices and their data to be connected in an easy-to-use and open way. The wide adoption of the SensorThings API would contribute to an IoT ecosystem that is healthy and interconnected, rather than one that is proprietary, incompatible and fragmented.

Scope

Whiskers is an OGC SensorThings API framework consisting of a JavaScript client and a light-weight server for IoT gateways. As the OGC SensorThings API standard specification continues to evolve, Whiskers will evolve with it.

Description

Whiskers is an OGC SensorThings API framework consisting of a JavaScript client and a light-weight server for IoT gateways (e.g., Raspberry Pi). The SensorThings API is an OGC (Open Geospatial Consortium) standard that allows IoT (Internet of Things) devices and their data to be connected; a major goal is to foster a healthy and open IoT ecosystem, as opposed to one dominated by proprietary information silos.

JavaScript is ubiquitous, powering client-side web applications and server-side services alike. The availability of an open source client library is an important step in the adoption of the OGC SensorThings standard, as it makes development quicker and easier.

In addition the a client library, Whiskers will also have a SensorThings server module for IoT gateways, such as Raspberry Pi. Developers will be able to deploy and configure IoT gateways, make them SensorThings API-compliant, and connect with spatial data servers around the world that implement the full array of OGC Sensor Web Enablement (SWE) standards.

Whiskers aims to make SensorThings development easy for the large and growing world of IoT developers.

Why Here?

The Eclipse Foundation is home to a large and growing number of IoT and geospatial projects (e.g., LocationTech), and is widely recognized for its good governance. Being a part of the Eclipse Community will bring Whiskers visibility, credibility and access to some of the most experienced minds in the open source world.

Future Work

Going forward, Whiskers will evolve along with the SensorThings API standard specification. The Sensing Profile of SensorThings (Part I) has been developed, and the Tasking Profile (Part II) is expected to be available in the upcoming months.  The SensorThings Rules Engine (Part III) is also under development within OGC.

 

Project Scheduling

Whiskers aims to have an initial contribution ready by the end of Q2 2016.

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Initial Contribution

There will be no initial contribution. The project will start from scratch.  We expect to use some existing Eclipse IoT libraries, such as Paho, Californium, and Kura.

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