Self-Configuring Communication Service Module Supporting Autonomous Control of Logistic Goods

This paper presents a concept of self-configuring mobile communication devices, such as sensor cluster heads, car mounted communication gateways etc. supporting the autonomous control of logistic goods. The main idea is to select and configure the communication network, service and protocol in a self-organised way at the mobile device, rather than initiating the networks, protocol and service selection by the network. In order not to force application developer to configure the complex communication devices and protocols, a communication service module (CSM) with a simple and well defined interface has been developed selecting and configuring the communication network and protocol. With this approach the application specifies the requirements by selecting a communication profile only. The Communication Service Module selects and configures the most suitable communication network technology and protocol. This enables easy improvement of the communication services and protocols without having to change the applications or user interfaces. The paper describes the concept and the first implementation on different computing platforms in detail.