Development of Software Models to Integrate Distributed RFID Technologies Into Management Information Systems
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Development of software models to integrate distributed RFID technologies into management information systems. By Fidel Nunez September 2010 A Thesis Submitted for the Degree of M.Eng Galway Mayo Institute of Technology Supervisor: Dr. John Owen-Jones Submitted to the Higher Education And Training Awards Council. September 2010 Galway - Mayo Institute of Technology Development of software models to integrate distributed RFID technologies into management information systems. Fidel Nunez Abstract The growth of Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) technologies within inventory and asset tracking processes during recent years, has caused a corresponding increase in the amounts of tracking data being generated at the edge of the network. This data requires filtering, processing and refining in order to produce information that can be used to provide more efficient business processes and aid decision making. New legislation such as the Sarbanes-Oxley Act has enforced the asset tracking process in organisations, with RFID enhanced asset tracking technology being proposed as an answer. This however, requires the creation of an economical software system to consume and filter the data being generated by the hardware readers, and provide integration via a middleware solution with existing Enterprise Resource Planning (ERP) systems. This thesis presents a method of collecting and processing data generated by RFID hardware. The manner in which the open source based web application1 that was designed for this project interacts with ERP systems via Microsoft BizTalk messaging system is also described. Finally this thesis looks at how users of the Juno system are presented and can interact with this information, to help in the asset tracking process. Security considerations are important due to the sensitive company financial information in use and this is considered later on. 1 Referred to as “Juno” within this project. i Galway Mayo Institute of Technology Declarations Copyright and DAI Statement I hereby grant the Galway Mayo Institute of Technology or its agents the right to archive and to make available my thesis or dissertation in whole or part in the Institute libraries in all forms of media, now or here after known, subject to the provisions of the Copyright & Related Rights Act, 2000. I retain all proprietary rights, such as patent rights. I also retain the right to use in future works (such as articles or books) all or part of this thesis or dissertation. I also authorise Institute Microfilms to use the 350 word abstract of my thesis in Dissertation Abstracts International. I have either used no substantial portions of copyright material in my thesis or I have obtained permission to use copyright material; where permission has not been granted I have applied/will apply for a partial restriction of the digital copy of my thesis or dissertation. Signed: ____________________ Date: ___________________ Authenticity Statement I certify that the Library deposit digital copy is a direct equivalent of the final officially approved version of my thesis. No emendation of content has occurred and if there are any minor variations in formatting, they are the result of the conversion to digital format. Signed: ____________________ Date: ___________________ Originality Statement I hereby declare that this submission is my own work and to the best of my knowledge it contains no materials previously published or written by another person, or substantial proportions of material which have been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma at GMIT or any other educational institution, except where due acknowledgement is made in the thesis. Any contribution made to the research by others, with whom I have worked at GMIT or elsewhere, is explicitly acknowledged in the thesis. I also declare that the intellectual content of this thesis is the product of my own work, except to the extent that assistance from others in the project's design and conception or in style, presentation and linguistic expression is acknowledged. Signed: ____________________ Date: ___________________ ii Galway Mayo Institute of Technology Acknowledgements With the completion of this project and thesis an important chapter of my life comes to an end. I wish to say thanks to the following people for their help and support throughout this project: • My supervisor, Dr. John Owen-Jones for advice and guidance on the project and this thesis. • Enterprise Ireland and their financial support, without which this research and project would not have been possible. • GMIT for providing the facilities to accomplish this research. • James O’Shaughnessy, a fellow researcher with whom it was a pleasure to work with on this project, and for sharing his broad ranging knowledge on RFID and networking technologies. • Mr. Andrew Shields for his expertise and work on the BizTalk middleware integration. I am delighted to have been presented this wonderful opportunity to learn a wide range of Software Engineering skills and work with emerging technologies. iii Galway Mayo Institute of Technology Table of Contents Abstract .............................................................................................................................. i Declarations ...................................................................................................................... ii Acknowledgements .......................................................................................................... iii Table of Contents ............................................................................................................. iv List of Figures and Tables ............................................................................................... viii Chapter 1 – Introduction ................................................................................................... 1 Motivation for developing Juno fixed asset tracking system ........................................ 1 Aims and objectives of the research work .................................................................... 3 Research Methodology ................................................................................................. 6 Thesis Structure ............................................................................................................. 6 Chapter 2 – Literature Review .......................................................................................... 8 RFID ................................................................................................................................ 8 Overview ................................................................................................................... 8 Readers ...................................................................................................................... 9 Tags ......................................................................................................................... 10 Middleware ................................................................................................................. 14 Review of existing RFID middleware systems ............................................................. 17 Microsoft BizTalk ..................................................................................................... 17 IBM WebSphere RFID .............................................................................................. 18 Review of existing RFID asset tracking systems .......................................................... 20 “Global SAW Tag” RFID system ............................................................................... 20 “OATSystem” and “Reva” RFID Asset tracking systems .......................................... 22 RFID Asset Tracking Alternatives ................................................................................. 23 iv Galway Mayo Institute of Technology Bokode’s .................................................................................................................. 23 RuBee ...................................................................................................................... 23 Software architectures and Design Patterns ............................................................... 25 Multi-Tier Architecture ........................................................................................... 26 Model View Controller ............................................................................................ 28 Front Controller ....................................................................................................... 31 Registry Pattern ....................................................................................................... 32 Chapter 3 – System Requirements and Technologies .................................................... 34 Requirements .............................................................................................................. 34 System Usage Scenario ........................................................................................... 37 Technologies ................................................................................................................ 39 Linux OpenSUSE ...................................................................................................... 39 VMware ................................................................................................................... 41 MySQL ....................................................................................................................