The inherently limited processing power and battery lifetime of mobile phones hinder the possible execution of computationally intensive applications like content-based video analysis or 3D modeling. Offloading of computationally intensive application parts from the mobile platform into a remote cloud infrastructure or nearby idle computers addresses this problem. This paper presents our Mobile Augmentation Cloud Services (MACS) middleware which enables adaptive extension of Android application execution from a mobile client into the cloud. Applications are developed by using the standard Android development pattern. The middleware does the heavy lifting of adaptive application partitioning, resource monitoring and computation offloading. These elastic mobile applications can run as usual mobile application, but they can also reach transparently remote computing resources. Two prototype applications using the MACS middleware demonstrate the benefits of the approach. The evaluation shows that applications, which involve complicated algorithms and large computations, can benefit from offloading with around 95% energy savings and significant performance gains compared to local execution only.

Research in process-centered environments (PCEs) has focused on project management support and has neglected method guidance for the engineers performing the (software) engineering process. It has been dominated by the search for suitable process-modeling languages and enactment mechanisms. The consequences of process orientation on the computer-based engineering environments, i.e., the interactive tools used during process performance, have been studied much less. In this article, we present the PRIME (Process Integrated Modeling Environments) framework which empowers method guidance through process-integrated tools. In contrast to the tools of PCEs, the process-integrated tools of PRIME adjust their behavior according to the current process situation and the method definitions. Process integration of PRIME tools is achieved through (1) the definition of tool models; (2) the integration of the tool models and the method definitions; (3) the interpretation of the integrated environment model by the tools, the process-aware control integration mechanism, and the enactment mechanism; and (4) the synchronization of the tools and the enactment mechanism based on a comprehensive interaction protocol. We sketch the implementation of PRIME as a reusable implementation framework which facilitates the realization of process-integrated tools as well as the process integration of external tools. We define a six-step procedure for building a PRIME-based process-integrated environment (PIE) and illustrate how PRIME facilitates change integration on an easy-to-adapt modeling level.

The inherently limited processing power and battery lifetime of mobile phones hinder the possible execution of computationally intensive applications like content-based video analysis or 3D modeling. Offloading of computationally intensive application parts from the mobile platform into a remote cloud infrastructure or nearby idle computers addresses this problem. This paper presents our Mobile Augmentation Cloud Services (MACS) middleware which enables adaptive extension of Android application execution from a mobile client into the cloud. Applications are developed by using the standard Android development pattern. The middleware does the heavy lifting of adaptive application partitioning, resource monitoring and computation offloading. These elastic mobile applications can run as usual mobile application, but they can also use remote computing resources transparently. Two prototype applications using the MACS middleware demonstrate the benefits of the approach. The evaluation shows that applications, which involve costly computations, can benefit from offloading with around 95% energy savings and significant performance gains compared to local execution only.

The innovation potential of niche communities often remains inaccessible to service providers due to a lack of awareness and effective negotiation between these two groups. Requirements Bazaar, a browser-based social software for Social Requirements Engineering (SRE), aims at bringing together communities and service providers into such a negotiation process. Communities should be supported to express and trace their requirements and eventually receive a realization. Service providers should be supported in discovering relevant innovative requirements to maximize impact with a realization. In this paper we present Requirements Bazaar with focus on four aspects: requirements specification, a workflow for co-creation, workspace integration and personalizable requirements prioritization.