A Proxy for Distributed Hash Table based Machine-to-Machine Networks

Abstract: Wireless sensor networks (WSNs) have been an increasingly interest for both researchers and entrepreneurs. As WSN technologies gradually matured and more and more use is reported, we find that most of current WSNs are still designed only for specific purposes. For example, one WSN may be used to gather information from a field and the collected data is not shared with other parties. We propose a distributed hash table (DHT) based machine-to-machine (M2M) system for connecting different WSNs together in order to fully utilize information collected from currently available WSNs. This thesis specifically looks at how to design and implement a proxy for such a system. We discuss why such a proxy can be useful for DHT-based M2M systems, what the proxy should consist of, and what kind of architecture is suitable. We also look into different communication protocols that can be used in these systems and discuss which ones best suit our purposes. The design of the proxy focuses on network management and service discovery of WSNs, and security considerations as well as caching mechanisms in order to improve performance. A prototype is implemented based on our design and evaluated. We find it feasible to implement such a DHT-based M2M system and a proxy in the system can be necessary and useful. Finally, we draw conclusions and discuss what future work remains to be done.