Benchmark Applications Used in Mobile Cloud Computing: A Systematic Mapping Study

Mobile Cloud Computing (MCC) integrates mobile computing and cloud computing aiming to extend mobile devices capabilities through offloading techniques. In MCC, many controlled experiments have been performed using mobile applications as benchmarks. Usually, these applications are used to validate proposed algorithms, architectures or frameworks. The task of choosing a specific benchmark to evaluate MCC proposals is difficult because there is no standard applications list. This paper presents a systematic mapping study for benchmarks used in MCC research. Taking five months of work, we have read 763 papers from MCC field. We catalogued the applications and characterizes them considering three facets: category (e.g.: games, imaging tools); evaluated resource (e.g.: time, energy); and platform (e.g.: Android, iPhone). The mapping study evidences research gaps and research trends. Providing a list of downloadable standardized benchmarks, this work can aid better choices to guide more reliable research studies since the same application could be used for different scientific purposes.