EXWeb: remotely operating devices in the home network

Cellular phones are now accepted as multifunctional devices. E-mail and Internet access are now the norm. On the other hand, home networking middleware and their application program interfaces (e.g. Jini, HAVi, UPnP) have received increasing attention and research on remote device management in home networks by cellular phones is on-going. There are a number of issues that arise from accessing home networks over cellular phones and getting data, such as small screens, lower processing power than PCs and less memory than PCs. Thus cellular phones cannot display pictures as PCs can and cannot run Jini applications. If a user in a hotel remotely plays a videocassette on a VCR located in a home networked environment, that audio and video cannot be displayed on his cellular phone. We propose the EXWeb platform to operate devices remotely by using a Web browser installed in a cellular phone. We use NTT Docomo's i-mode compatible cellular phone. To overcome the lower processing power of cellular phones, we implement an EXServer acting as a Jini client via a Java Servlet. The EXServer resides on a Web server. The Web browser on the cellular phone sends an BTTP message to the EXServer. The EXServer transforms it into a Jini message and sends the Jini message to a remote Jini device. The user interface is integrated into the Web browser and offers a uniform access environment to the home network. It provides an easy to use system that remotely operates devices and redirects output via a cellular phone. We describe our implemented prototype that remotely operates a VCR located in a home networked environment.