F2C-Aware: Enabling Discovery in Wi-Fi-Powered Fog-to-Cloud (F2C) Systems

Abstract

<p>Fog-to-Cloud (F2C) is a novel architectural framework,</p> <p>driven by the needs imposed by emerging ubiquitous</p> <p>applications and relying on the coordinated use of fog and</p> <p>cloud computing. Within such a setup, a suitable mechanism</p> <p>addressing the resource discovery problem, taking into account</p> <p>fog-specific characteristics (i.e. mobility, heterogeneity, etc.) is</p> <p>yet to be defined. On the other hand, the proliferation of Wi-</p> <p>Fi has been remarkably growing with inherent support for an</p> <p>interesting feature set. One such feature is to embed vendorspecific</p> <p>information within the beacon frame in order to provide</p> <p>customized Wi-Fi-based informational services. In this paper,</p> <p>we propose F2C-Aware, a discovery approach that leverages</p> <p>this feature to allow devices in Wi-Fi-powered Fog-to-Cloud</p> <p>systems to become aware of each other. The proposed approach</p> <p>takes into account the fact that devices in the fog are not</p> <p>necessarily connected to the same local network and thus it</p> <p>provides discovery prior to network association, which could help</p> <p>in obtaining time and energy savings.</p>