Mobile web and cloud services

Abstract

The developments in the web services domain, the improved device capabilities of the smart phones, the increased transmission rates of the cellular networks and the ubiquity of the wifi networks have lead to the mobile web services (MWS). In MWS domain, the resource constrained smart phones can act as both web service clients and providers (Mobile Host), thus forming a Mobile Enterprise. Simultaneously, with the advent of cloud computing, mobiles tried to utilize cloud services which, most often, provide web service interfaces. The benefits of offloading tasks to the cloud include extended battery lifetime, improved storage capacity and increased processing power, for the mobile devices. This paper summarizes the research associated with mobile web and cloud services. The QoS aspects of the Mobile Host, like providing proper security and scalability, the discovery of the provided services, the integrational aspects of the different technological solutions and their migration to the cloud are thoroughly discussed. The paper also discusses Mobile Cloud Middleware (MCM), which eases the invocation of multiple cloud services from mobiles. MCM raises the necessity for an asynchronous notification mechanism and with the Mobile Host feature; this is as simple as providing one more service from the device.