Operating Systems for Wireless Sensor Networks: A Survey

This paper presents a survey on the current state-of-the-art in Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) Operating Systems (OSs). In recent years, WSNs have received tremendous attention in the research community, with applications in battlefields, industrial process monitoring, home automation, and environmental monitoring, to name but a few. A WSN is a highly dynamic network because nodes die due to severe environmental conditions and battery power depletion. Furthermore, a WSN is composed of miniaturized motes equipped with scarce resources e.g., limited memory and computational abilities. WSNs invariably operate in an unattended mode and in many scenarios it is impossible to replace sensor motes after deployment, therefore a fundamental objective is to optimize the sensor motes’ life time. These characteristics of WSNs impose additional challenges on OS design for WSN, and consequently, OS design for WSN deviates from traditional OS design. The purpose of this survey is to highlight major concerns pertaining to OS design in WSNs and to point out strengths and weaknesses of contemporary OSs for WSNs, keeping in mind the requirements of emerging WSN applications. The state-of-the-art in operating systems for WSNs has been examined in terms of the OS Architecture, Programming Model, Scheduling, Memory Management and Protection, Communication Protocols, Resource Sharing, Support for Real-Time Applications, and additional features. These features are surveyed for both real-time and non-real-time WSN operating systems.

[1]  David E. Culler,et al.  The nesC language: A holistic approach to networked embedded systems , 2003, PLDI.

[2]  Chung Laung Liu,et al.  Scheduling Algorithms for Multiprogramming in a Hard-Real-Time Environment , 1989, JACM.

[3]  David E. Culler,et al.  TOSSIM: accurate and scalable simulation of entire TinyOS applications , 2003, SenSys '03.

[4]  Paul J.M. Havinga,et al.  DCOS, a real-time light-weight Data Centric Operating System , 2004 .

[5]  Philippas Tsigas,et al.  ContikiSec: A Secure Network Layer for Wireless Sensor Networks under the Contiki Operating System , 2009, NordSec.

[6]  Anthony Rowe,et al.  Rate-Harmonized Scheduling for Saving Energy , 2008, 2008 Real-Time Systems Symposium.

[7]  Fredrik Österlind,et al.  A Sensor Network Simulator for the Contiki OS , 2006 .

[8]  Wei Hong,et al.  TinyDB: an acquisitional query processing system for sensor networks , 2005, TODS.

[9]  H. S. Wolff,et al.  iRun: Horizontal and Vertical Shape of a Region-Based Graph Compression , 2022, Sensors.

[10]  Nael B. Abu-Ghazaleh,et al.  A taxonomy of wireless micro-sensor network models , 2002, MOCO.

[11]  Anthony Rowe,et al.  FireFly: A Time Synchronized Real-Time Sensor Networking Platform , 2007 .

[12]  David E. Culler,et al.  TinyOS: An Operating System for Sensor Networks , 2005, Ambient Intelligence.

[13]  Adam Dunkels,et al.  Cross-Level Sensor Network Simulation with COOJA , 2006, Proceedings. 2006 31st IEEE Conference on Local Computer Networks.

[14]  Ian F. Akyildiz,et al.  A survey on wireless multimedia sensor networks , 2007, Comput. Networks.

[15]  Philip Levis,et al.  Maté: a tiny virtual machine for sensor networks , 2002, ASPLOS X.

[16]  Laura Marie Feeney,et al.  An integrated approach to developing sensor network solutions , 2004 .

[17]  Jeff Rose,et al.  MANTIS OS: An Embedded Multithreaded Operating System for Wireless Micro Sensor Platforms , 2005, Mob. Networks Appl..

[18]  Robert Szewczyk,et al.  System architecture directions for networked sensors , 2000, ASPLOS IX.

[19]  Tarek F. Abdelzaher,et al.  The LiteOS Operating System: Towards Unix-Like Abstractions for Wireless Sensor Networks , 2008, 2008 International Conference on Information Processing in Sensor Networks (ipsn 2008).

[20]  John P. Lehoczky,et al.  The rate monotonic scheduling algorithm: exact characterization and average case behavior , 1989, [1989] Proceedings. Real-Time Systems Symposium.

[21]  Deborah Estrin,et al.  A Remote Code Update Mechanism for Wireless Sensor Networks , 2003 .

[22]  David E. Culler,et al.  The dynamic behavior of a data dissemination protocol for network programming at scale , 2004, SenSys '04.

[23]  Alvise Bonivento,et al.  Platform-Based Design of Wireless Sensor Networks for Industrial Applications , 2006, Proceedings of the Design Automation & Test in Europe Conference.

[24]  S. Manesis,et al.  A Survey of Applications of Wireless Sensors and Wireless Sensor Networks , 2005, Proceedings of the 2005 IEEE International Symposium on, Mediterrean Conference on Control and Automation Intelligent Control, 2005..

[25]  D. Janaki Ram,et al.  Wireless sensor network operating systems: a survey , 2009, Int. J. Sens. Networks.

[26]  Hamed Haddadi,et al.  A biologically-inspired approach to designing wireless sensor networks , 2005, Proceeedings of the Second European Workshop on Wireless Sensor Networks, 2005..

[27]  Stefan Dulman.  Operating System Fundamentals for the EYES Distributed Sensor Network , 2002 .

[28]  Adam Dunkels,et al.  Using Protothreads for Sensor Node Programming , 2005 .

[29]  Emin Gün Sirer,et al.  On the need for system-level support for ad hoc and sensor networks , 2002, OPSR.

[30]  Ramesh Govindan,et al.  TOSThreads: thread-safe and non-invasive preemption in TinyOS , 2009, SenSys '09.

[31]  Kay Römer,et al.  The design space of wireless sensor networks , 2004, IEEE Wireless Communications.

[32]  R. Venkateswarlu,et al.  A Simple Model for Evaluating the Scalability in Wireless Sensor Networks , 2005, 2005 International Conference on Intelligent Sensors, Sensor Networks and Information Processing.

[33]  JAMAL N. AL-KARAKI,et al.  Routing techniques in wireless sensor networks: a survey , 2004, IEEE Wireless Communications.

[34]  Paul J.M. Havinga,et al.  Lightweight EDF Scheduling with Deadline Inheritance , 2003 .

[35]  Matt Welsh,et al.  CodeBlue: An Ad Hoc Sensor Network Infrastructure for Emergency Medical Care , 2004 .

[36]  Eric Eide,et al.  Efficient memory safety for TinyOS , 2007, SenSys '07.

[37]  Shuichi Oikawa,et al.  Resource kernels: a resource-centric approach to real-time and multimedia systems , 2001, Electronic Imaging.

[38]  Deborah Estrin,et al.  EmStar: A Software Environment for Developing and Deploying Wireless Sensor Networks , 2004, USENIX ATC, General Track.

[39]  Adam Dunkels,et al.  Low-power wireless IPv6 routing with ContikiRPL , 2010, IPSN '10.

[40]  Angelos Bilas,et al.  CORMOS: a communication-oriented runtime system for sensor networks , 2005, Proceeedings of the Second European Workshop on Wireless Sensor Networks, 2005..

[41]  Adam Dunkels,et al.  Protothreads - Lightweight Stackless Threads in C , 2005 .

[42]  Youxian Sun,et al.  Wireless sensor networks for industrial applications , 2004, Fifth World Congress on Intelligent Control and Automation (IEEE Cat. No.04EX788).

[43]  D Janakiram,et al.  Operating Systems for Wireless Sensor Networks: A Survey Technical Report , 2007 .

[44]  Anthony Rowe,et al.  Nano-RK: an energy-aware resource-centric RTOS for sensor networks , 2005, 26th IEEE International Real-Time Systems Symposium (RTSS'05).

[45]  Philip Levis,et al.  Data Discovery and Dissemination with DIP , 2008, 2008 International Conference on Information Processing in Sensor Networks (ipsn 2008).

[46]  Seth Copen Goldstein,et al.  Active messages: a mechanism for integrating communication and computation , 1998, ISCA '98.

[47]  Hojung Cha,et al.  Multithreading Optimization Techniques for Sensor Network Operating Systems , 2007, EWSN.

[48]  Adam Dunkels,et al.  Enabling large-scale storage in sensor networks with the Coffee file system , 2009, 2009 International Conference on Information Processing in Sensor Networks.

[49]  Mani B. Srivastava,et al.  A dynamic operating system for sensor nodes , 2005, MobiSys '05.

[50]  David E. Culler,et al.  Transmission of IPv6 Packets over IEEE 802.15.4 Networks , 2007, RFC.

[51]  Om Prakash Vyas,et al.  Operating Systems for Tiny Networked Sensors: A Survey , 2009 .

[52]  Adam Dunkels,et al.  Contiki - a lightweight and flexible operating system for tiny networked sensors , 2004, 29th Annual IEEE International Conference on Local Computer Networks.

[53]  John K. Ousterhout,et al.  Why Threads Are A Bad Idea , 2013 .

[54]  Jenna Burrell,et al.  Vineyard computing: sensor networks in agricultural production , 2004, IEEE Pervasive Computing.

[55]  William Stallings,et al.  Wireless Communications and Networks , 2001, 2020 International Conference on Smart Systems and Technologies (SST).

[56]  Nader Mohamed,et al.  Middleware: middleware challenges and approaches for wireless sensor networks , 2006, IEEE Distributed Systems Online.

[57]  Philip Levis,et al.  RPL: IPv6 Routing Protocol for Low-Power and Lossy Networks , 2012, RFC.

[58]  Anantha Chandrakasan,et al.  Dynamic Power Management in Wireless Sensor Networks , 2001, IEEE Des. Test Comput..

[59]  Ian F. Akyildiz,et al.  Wireless sensor networks: a survey , 2002, Comput. Networks.

[60]  Jens Palsberg,et al.  Avrora: scalable sensor network simulation with precise timing , 2005, IPSN 2005. Fourth International Symposium on Information Processing in Sensor Networks, 2005..

[61]  Anthony Rowe,et al.  RT-Link: A Time-Synchronized Link Protocol for Energy- Constrained Multi-hop Wireless Networks , 2006, 2006 3rd Annual IEEE Communications Society on Sensor and Ad Hoc Communications and Networks.

[62]  Sandeep K. S. Gupta,et al.  Research challenges in wireless networks of biomedical sensors , 2001, MobiCom '01.

[63]  Lui Sha,et al.  Priority Inheritance Protocols: An Approach to Real-Time Synchronization , 1990, IEEE Trans. Computers.

[64]  Mani Srivastava,et al.  A Unified Network and Node Level Simulation Framework for Wireless Sensor Networks , 2003 .

[65]  David E. Culler,et al.  The Emergence of Networking Abstractions and Techniques in TinyOS , 2004, NSDI.

[66]  David A. Wagner,et al.  TinySec: a link layer security architecture for wireless sensor networks , 2004, SenSys '04.

[67]  Eric A. Brewer,et al.  USENIX Association Proceedings of HotOS IX : The 9 th Workshop on Hot Topics in Operating Systems , 2003 .