| Mobile Computing Application Issues |
The programs used in mobile devices like mobile phones,
laptops, palm computers, etc. for internet connectivity and other computer
related activities are called mobile computing applications. The various issues
and designs of mobile computing application are discussed under various headings
below.
Technical Design
First comes the Technical Design Issues, which consist of
network design, capacity planning, response time calculations, data compression
considerations, system availability design and security issues. The technical
design plays a key role in a mobile computing project and offers unique
challenges to the system professionals.
Network Design
aIssues regarding Wireless LAN design and Wide Area Radio
Network Design which network design comprises are discussed below.
a. Wireless LAN design issuess
- The number of mobile users who will use wireless LAN and the number of
them active during the peak period.
- The types of LAN application accessed by them. (Keeping in mind that
wireless LANs will not be acceptable for the intended users as they operate
at much slower speeds than wired LANs).
- Use of notebook with a wireless NIC as a primary and user device.
- Roaming areas, location & range of needed access point.
- Impact of construction materials in single penetration.
- Preferred technology-spread spectrum or frequency hopping.
- Radio frequency interference from any other devices in office, factory
or campus etc.
b. Wide Area Radio Network Design Issues
- The need of building a private radio network.
- Most appropriate radio network technology for the suite of applications.
- Matching of user application-usage profiles to a given network capacity.
- Integration of RNA technology with a radio network infrastructure.
- Ensuring good coverage & minimum number of dead spots.
- If distributed wireless network design with several MCSSs must be used?
- Managing the way logic networks will be influenced by network design
options.
The Capacity Planning & response time Calculations.
A mobile computing application transaction has to cover a
synchronous set of hardware as well as software components before it reaches the
destination server. Diverse physical links, wireless & wired line in between the
end user's client application software and the information server are present in
its reverse path too. So scheduling on a network requires complex rules, which
makes it difficult to build a mathematical model to estimate response times.
Planning reliable capacities in advance is a hard task still. The network
providers give an estimate using complex queuing models or rule-of thumb
calculation based on the other customer's experience.
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