A Novel Web Service Directory Framework for Mobile Environments

Mobile devices are evolving as a new computing platform and a common means to provide access and process digital information. In the move to achieve ubiquitous computing, the role of mobile devices and web services cannot be understated. Mobile devices are predominantly in use for accessing web services. The same mobile devices are now becoming a feasible option for small and medium size enterprises to host and provide personalized web services to clients. The motivation being the minimal infrastructure requirements and configuration costs. Technology today enables the provision of web services over hand-held mobile devices, realizing a web based service-oriented architecture in a mobile environment. For this, an efficient service discovery mechanism is required. It is difficult to adapt traditional approaches of managing web service directory for mobile environments, this is mainly due to the dynamic arrivals/departures of mobile devices in network zones. In this paper, we propose a model for web services in mobile environments to maintain a service directory using the XMPP (eXtensible Messaging and Presence Protocol). The proposed model enables mobile devices to manage web service directory without requiring high-end computers and high management cost. This paper presents proposed architecture, design concept, system components and workflow of the framework. Moreover, a comparative study of the proposed approach and the traditional UDDI (Universal Description, Discovery, and Integration) registry is presented.