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Virginia Tech

Simulating IoT Frameworks and Devices in the Smart Home

Abstract

dc:description.abstract

The rapid growth of the Internet of Things (IoT) has led to a situation where individual manufacturers develop their own communication protocols and frameworks that are often incompatible with other systems. Part of this is due to the use of incompatible communication hardware, and part is due to the entrenched proprietary systems. This has created a heterogeneous communication landscape, where it is difficult for devices to coordinate their efforts. To remedy this, a number of IoT Frameworks have been proposed to provide a common interface between IoT devices. There are many approaches to common frameworks, each with their strengths and weaknesses, but there is no clear winner among them. This thesis presents a virtual network testbed for implementing smart home IoT Frameworks. It consists of a simulated home network made up of multiple Virtual Machines (VM), simulated smart home devices and an implementation of the OpenHAB framework to integrate the devices. Simulated devices are designed to be network- accurate representations of actual devices, a LIFX smart lightbulb was developed and an existing Nest thermostat simulation was integrated. The demonstrated setup serves as a proof of concept for the idea of a home network testbed. Such a testbed could allow for the development of new IoT frameworks or the comparison of existing ones, and it could also serve as an education aid to illustrate how smart home IoT devices communicate with one another.

Degree

thesis:*
Name thesis:degree_name
Master of Science
Level thesis:degree_level
masters
Discipline thesis:degree_discipline
Computer Engineering
Department dc:contributor.department
Electrical and Computer Engineering
Grantor dc:publisher
Virginia Tech
Year dc:date.issued
2017

Author and committee

dc:creator, dc:contributor.*
Author dc:creator
  • Kalin, John Howard
Chairs dc:contributor.committeechair
  • Tront, Joseph G.
  • Plymale, William O.
Committee member dc:contributor.committeemember
  • Martin, Thomas L.

Subjects

dc:subject × 5

Rights

dc:rights
Statement dc:rights
  • In Copyright

Identifiers

dc:identifier.*
Dc Identifier Other
vt_gsexam:12733
OAI identifier oai:identifier
oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/78767

Chain of custody

source
Harvested from
Virginia Tech
Base URL
vtechworks.lib.vt.edu/oai/request
Last updated
2026-07-22
Source record
OAI-PMH GetRecord
citation

Kalin, John Howard. Simulating IoT Frameworks and Devices in the Smart Home. masters thesis, Virginia Tech, 2017. http://hdl.handle.net/10919/78767