Experiences applying Sensor Web Enablement to a practical telecare application

BTpsilas research and venturing department has participated in a number of sensor network projects covering a wide range of domains. Each project, however, has relied on bespoke sensor hardware, interfaces and communications, leading to stove-pipe solutions that cannot be easily reused nor utilized by other projects or initiatives. These highly specialised solutions have made it difficult for other projects to re-use the solutions and also to combine sensed data into a common information space. This approach however, is also widely seen in the marketplace where many companies offer highly specialised single point sensor solutions. This ldquooptimisedrdquo solution approach has driven interest in the design of generic architectures that permit open access to and reuse of sensors and their observations. Developments in the specification of IP-based technologies such as sensor Web enablement (SWE) and their application in real world sensor network solutions are undergoing extensive investigation by the pervasive ICT (PICT) Centre in BT. This paper describes the smart and aware pervasive healthcare environment (SAPHE) project and our experiences of taking this traditional stove-piped application and creating SWE compliant services.