A wireless agent for autonomous file synchronization in a mobile environment

This paper describes a wireless agent that contributes to the realization of pervasive computing. More concretely, we present a method that manages the file synchronization in a mobile environment. Our wireless agent resides at a mobile client, and automatically completes the file synchronization with the serve while users move through communication service areas. It has the following features: First, to deal with the instability unavoidable in a highly mobile communication, the connection time is predicted based on the average and standard deviation of RF signal strength to determine the optimal timing for attempting connection. Secondly, based on the predicted connection time and due times of files, it determines the file for synchronization in an optimal manner. Thirdly, by maintaining the metadata, it guarantees the consistent synchronization even under several sudden disconnections. We show the experimental results to demonstrate the usefulness and effectiveness of our wireless agent.