A Reference Model for Monitoring IoT WSN-Based Applications

The Internet of Things (IoT) is, at this moment, one of the most promising technologies that has arisen for decades. Wireless Sensor Networks (WSNs) are one of the main pillars for many IoT applications, insofar as they require to obtain context-awareness information. The bibliography shows many difficulties in their real implementation that have prevented its massive deployment. Additionally, in IoT environments where data producers and data consumers are not directly related, compatibility and certification issues become fundamental. Both problems would profit from accurate knowledge of the internal behavior of WSNs that must be obtained by the utilization of appropriate tools. There are many ad-hoc proposals with no common structure or methodology, and intended to monitor a particular WSN. To overcome this problem, this paper proposes a structured three-layer reference model for WSN Monitoring Platforms (WSN-MP), which offers a standard environment for the design of new monitoring platforms to debug, verify and certify a WSN's behavior and performance, and applicable to every WSN. This model also allows the comparative analysis of the current proposals for monitoring the operation of WSNs. Following this methodology, it is possible to achieve a standardization of WSN-MP, promoting new research areas in order to solve the problems of each layer.