Building a testbed for the internet of things

Abstract

Over the past few years a technological outbreak has been noticed in the area of electronics and computer networks, granting eligibility to connect these fields in the direction of building intelligent systems. These systems have the ability to increase the growth of Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) in urban environments and to provide services able to significantly upgrade the general well-being of individuals and societies. The whole concept of an Internet of Things (IoT) is reviewed in this thesis, architectures are discussed and some notable commercial solutions are presented. We then build our own development platform by setting up a wireless network of sub-GHz devices and connecting it to a virtual Internet cloud. Moreover, software applications are designed to complete an End-to-End Machine to Machine (M2M) communication network and therefore, emulate an entire Internet of Things environment. The communication framework that is developed, allows us to research a variety of IoT concepts including the upcoming smart grid which is a significant improvement to the current electric power distribution system.