Context-aware Web services are identified as an important technology to support new applications on the future Internet. Context information has several qualities that make the development of these services challenging, compared to conventional, Web services. Therefore, sound software engineering practices are needed during their development and execution. This article discusses a novel software engineering-based approach, which leverages the benefits of model-driven architecture, aspect-oriented modeling, and formal model checking, for modeling and verifying context-aware services. The approach is explored using a real-world case study in intelligent transport. An evaluation framework is established to validate the main methods and tools employed.

Context-dependent information is tightly coupling or crosscutting the core functionality of a service at the service interface level. This results in a complex design, which is difficult to implement and maintain. The crosscutting context-dependent functionality of interacting pervasive services can be modeled as aspect-oriented models in UML. However, this has two challenges: the semi-formal nature of UML notations, and the expressive power of aspects. This paper explores model checking as a solution for modeling aspectual pervasive software services and their compositions, and rigorously verifying the process behavior of these models against specified system properties. Model checking is applied, first to check the behavior of the individual pervasive aspects and components, and second to verify the overall behavior of the woven model even if no errors are found in the individual pervasive aspects and components. These verification stages have been used to gain confidence before the complex pervasive services are actually implemented. The approach is explored using a real-world case study in intelligent transport with more than 30 properties formalized to provide a comprehensive coverage of the system requirements. An evaluation framework has been established to validate the main methods and tools employed in the study.

An efficient logical topology helps wireless sensor networks (WSNs) minimizing different constraints. For large-scale WSNs, chain oriented logical topologies are shown to be more energy conservative than other logical topologies. Chain construction is the main challenge to create a chain oriented logical topology. In this paper, we propose a chain construction scheme, which creates several chains for the topology using Voronoi tessellation. The main idea of this scheme is to divide the target field into a number of small areas (i.e., Voronoi cells) so that in each cell, a chain is constructed. To construct a chain in a Voronoi cell, we use a protocol, which guarantees the summation of square to the distances would be the lowest. We compare our chain construction algorithm with other similar algorithms. Simulation results show that proposed Voronoi diagram based algorithm saves more energy, lengthens lifetime of the network, and reduces data collection latency.

Energy consumption and lifetime of networks are the two most important constraints for wireless sensor networks (WSNs). Moreover, for perceiving events with respect to time, WSNs need to maintain coverage quality. This paper focuses on coverage problem with a number of sensors selected from deployed sensor nodes, which develop chain oriented communication. To mitigate the constraints of sensor nodes researchers employ a variety of logical topologies, among which chain oriented topology is one of the significant contender. Moreover, choosing only a selected number of sensors, instead of choosing all of them saves more energy and lengthens lifetime of the network. The main criterion to select a sensor node we propose in this paper is the use of shared sensing region of a sensor node with its neighbours. Simulation results show that our protocol saves a large number of sensor nodes while maintaining significant amount of coverage ratio.

This paper muses over two e-engineering projects, which use service-oriented architectures to navigate the complexities of e-engineering age. One of these projects is a Monash University Software Engineering (MUSE) portal, which has been developed to provide a central mechanism for group interaction, collaboration and knowledge aggregation to assist students in completing their final year capstone projects. Learning in part of a wider ecology, and benefits from interdependent resources and expertise in an organizational grouping forming a Web of interconnected parts. Collaboration and cooperation sustains this ecology (Maiden, 2003). The paper explores the interconnected aspects via service-oriented architectures and organization units (be it for a course or organizations in a consortium). The paper details the service-oriented architecture of our MUSE portal which is aimed at sustaining the capstone group's ecological requirements of collaboration and cooperation in their group project. The second project is about an E-commerce (B2B) Technology Infusion Project for Australian Rail Manufacturers (ARM). It uses emerging innovative business models with Web services and associated technology to deliver B2B as a new technology infusion program initiative from the research organization (MUSE) to the industry consortium of ARM. It is aimed at providing business integration through Web services (B2B) for a cluster of small to medium enterprises (SMEs). We reflect on (muse over) how the organisational ecology is achieved for the MUSE portal and for the ARM Consortium's B2B project. Services are discrete, self-contained applications that sit within the MUSE portal framework. Web services suit the decentralised nature of this B2B project.

This paper describes our work on establishing an on-line learning community to facilitate the interactions of the student (teams) in their group projects. It is illustrated with a Portal in the capstone project of our Bachelor of Software Engineering (BSE) course. [2] reported on our Monash University Software Engineering (MUSE) Studio Lab and the innovative software engineering capstone project experience. Our student teams used to store the various artefacts, which were produced as part of the SE Studio (capstone) projects on the servers in the studio lab. However, these SE product and process artefacts were not accessible uniformly through a web browser in a MUSE Portal. The Portal environment is aimed at providing a virtual learning space, knowledge aggregation and user management. In this paper, we provide details of our pedagogical service based framework, which has been designed and built to provide features to Portal users. The framework supports services such as group/team collaboration, task tracking, and project planning.The collaboration and learning services available from our Knowledge Portal is based on the learning activities as defined by [1] Nonaka1994. Nonaka defines: socializing to exchange views and develop trust between team members, dialoguing to share mental models and develop common vocabulary, systemising to combine knowledge by visualising interactions and constructing artifacts and exercising to communicate and reflect on outcomes. We follow a similar approach to enable team members to discuss and reflect on group findings with respect to SE processes & products during the year long SE Studio project, and reflect over individual thesis components.A pedagogical service based framework can service the current pedagogical needs of the SE group projects, other related subjects, and SE Honours research projects and is also extendible with more services on a demand basis. The focus has been on allowing custom subject specific services to be created without having the inherent overheads.A pedagogical framework with service based architecture has been built to provide services to the Portal users. The Portal Environment is the front-end through which services are exposed. Examples of services are: task tracking and project planning in group projects; collaboration between team members in a group project in a subject unit; knowledge repository of product/project assets; calendar facility etc. Support infrastructure services of user authentication, role and service allocation etc. are also managed via the portal environment.We show how on-line learning communities can be supported using the MUSE knowledge portal. The framework supports services such as team collaboration, task tracking, and project planning. The url for MUSE Portal is http://museportal.csse.monash.edu.au:8080/MUSEPortalWeb/.

This paper presents our rationale in setting up an innovative studio lab called the MUSE (Monash University Software Engineering) Studio Lab for our final year undergraduate Software Engineering students in 2002, an evaluation of the outcomes for 2002 and plans for 2003 and beyond. We describe the Monash University Software Engineering (MUSE) Strategy to make the MUSE culture and MUSE agile process branding visible through the MUSE Studio Lab for the learners, academics, management and the outside world of academia and industry. This strategy is aimed at supporting a continuum of learning styles in three units in the final year of our Bachelor of Software Engineering Program. The teaching/learning model used is a predominantly constructivist/student-centered/active learning approach for the Capstone SE project (Studio unit), and a constructivist approach for the Honours Research thesis unit. A more traditional teaching approach is used for the Systems Validation, Verification, Quality & Standards unit based on traditional instructional design model which is objectivist in view of learning. We also provide details of the the middle weight process that student groups follow in their full year SE Capstone project. At MUSE Studio, we have fused pedagogy with technology.

Web-based discussion forums are used in a range of undergraduate and graduate courses in the School of Computer Science and Software Engineering at Monash University. The enthusiastic adoption of these facilities by students has impacted upon staff worklods and recently concerns have been raised by staff about the time and effort required to manage them. Furthermore, it has been difficult to determine the pedagogical value of these facilities and the level of educational support they provide to the teaching and learning community. This paper reports on staff use and management of discussion forums in their courses, and their perceptions of the value of these facilities as a source of help for students and a mechanism to provide feedback to staff. A final outcome of the study will be the establishment of guidelines for staff and students for the effective use of these facilities.

This paper describes our innovative web based system, DoIT. DoIT is an acronym for Dynamic Curriculum Organisation by Innovation through Technology. IEEE-CS and ACM have been working on developing a comprehensive body of knowledge on software engineering (SWEBOK) [1]. Carnegie-Mellon Software Engineering Institute [CMU/SEI-99-TR-032] has produced a document that presents some guidelines for using the SWEBOK to support effective curriculum design. Our DoIT project has used the SWEBOK classification to map the core units in our current BSE curriculum against the SWEBOK knowledge key areas. In many engineering disciplines, the accreditation of university curricula and the licensing and certification of practicing professionals are taken very seriously. These are seen as critical to ensure upgrading of course content and structure where warranted to achieve improvements in the level of professional practice. Recognition of the core body of knowledge in a discipline is crucial to the development and accreditation of university curricula. DoIT system has been engineered in a systematic and disciplined manner and allows our Bachelor of Software Engineering students at Monash University to view the key areas of software engineering body of knowledge (SWEBOK) that they learn in their core subjects of study as they progress through our course. The main objective of the system is to provide an Internet facility for the students to learn about what they have learnt in their subjects in terms of SWEBOK objectives. The main inputs to DoIT are the SWEBOK key areas, our BSE core subjects mapped to SWEBOK and BSE student information extracted from Monash' student ORACLE database at the beginning of each new semester of our BSE course. Our BSE students are able to interact with the DoIT system to retrieve a personalized competency profile (PCP) at the completion of each semester of study. The contents visualized through the web site DoIT evolves as the students move through the course and works with up to date information about students. The web-based system, DoIT can be viewed at http://www.csse.monash.edu.au/~doit/. The learning outcomes from DoIT can be considered from three perspectives [2]. It is about:

The Internet has been recognised not only as a tool for communication in the 21st century but also as an environment for enabling changes in the paradignm of teaching and learning. This paper describes our development effort, sponsored by the Committee of University Teaching Development (CUTSD98) Grant, in designing educational material on Object-Oriented (O-O) testing in an Internet environment. The aim of this work is to enhance the state of the art in learning O-O testing by visualizing the testing process and interactive courseware in virtual communities. We have endeavoured to create an effective Internet-based courseware known as LIGHTVIEWS which contains O-O testing case studies described by visual images, animation, and interactive lessons, to assist active participation by learners to result in better understanding and knowledge retention. Our approach employs appropriate UML diagrams, makes the diagrams test ready by including details of constraints as part of state/event transitions, and provides interactive lessons for learning O-O software testing. We have used four case studies to explore the various test selection techniques. We have included black-box testing at unit level in case study 1, and at the system level in case study 3. The case study 2 has been used to illustrate event based testing by visually representing the dynamics of Java applets at work, and using interactivity to learn how to test Java applets, threads, and applet communication. The case study 4 explores the various aspects of distributed components testing.

Concurrency and communication are two of the key features of distributed systems. These features can make systematic testing of distributed systems a complex task. A major problem is the explosion of the test space because of the potential for arbitrary interference of concurrent threads. This paper describes an approach for systematic testing of such systems in an object-oriented context. We use statecharts for system specification, and model the system behaviour as event-sequences. A test case, therefore, is primarily an event-sequence with concurrent threads represented as interleaving events. Communication-states with associated events represent communication between objects. The test-space explosion is controlled by an extension to Chow's (1978) algorithm for generating test sequences for finite state machines. The number of test sequences we require is O(n/sup 2/), where n is the sum of all events in all concurrent statecharts.