tinyDSM: A highly reliable cooperative data storage for Wireless Sensor Networks

The advantage of a Wireless Sensor Network (WSN) compared to a centric approach is the distribution of sensing suites. However, in order for such a system of distributed resources to work in a reliable and effective way a smart cooperation between nodes is needed. In this paper we propose a middleware approach for a highly reliable data storage that helps to assure data availability despite the well known WSN resource problems and disappearing or inactive nodes by providing a reasonable data redundancy in the system. Such a solution helps to ease the design and optimization of the data exchange between nodes as well. Our solution is configurable in order to satisfy the needs of the application on top regarding performance/requirements trade-off. The options specify the quantity and quality of the data replication. Additional features like event mechanism that monitors the data and the possibility to issue database like queries increase the applicability of our middleware. In this paper we focus on the evaluation of its capabilities regarding reliability, the consistency of replicates and the costs of the data management. The simulation results for a reasonable set-up show that the CPU load caused by the data replication is low (below 3 percent) and the average inconsistency time is as small as about 0,06 seconds for a single hop and about 0,15 seconds for a two hops replication area. There is still room for improvements, but a clear definition of problems helps to find ways to cope with them in order to achieve the chosen goals.