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A Unified Model for the Mobile-Edge-Cloud Continuum

Published: 01 April 2019 Publication History

Abstract

Technologies such as mobile, edge, and cloud computing have the potential to form a computing continuum for new, disruptive applications. At runtime, applications can choose to execute parts of their logic on different infrastructures that constitute the continuum, with the goal of minimizing latency and battery consumption and maximizing availability. In this article, we propose A3-E, a unified model for managing the life cycle of continuum applications. In particular, A3-E exploits the Functions-as-a-Service model to bring computation to the continuum in the form of microservices. Furthermore, A3-E selects where to execute a certain function based on the specific context and user requirements. The article also presents a prototype framework that implements the concepts behind A3-E. Results show that A3-E is capable of dynamically deploying microservices and routing the application’s requests, reducing latency by up to 90% when using edge instead of cloud resources, and battery consumption by 74% when computation has been offloaded.

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Published In

cover image ACM Transactions on Internet Technology
ACM Transactions on Internet Technology  Volume 19, Issue 2
Special Issue on Fog, Edge, and Cloud Integration
May 2019
288 pages
ISSN:1533-5399
EISSN:1557-6051
DOI:10.1145/3322882
  • Editor:
  • Ling Liu
Issue’s Table of Contents
Permission to make digital or hard copies of all or part of this work for personal or classroom use is granted without fee provided that copies are not made or distributed for profit or commercial advantage and that copies bear this notice and the full citation on the first page. Copyrights for components of this work owned by others than ACM must be honored. Abstracting with credit is permitted. To copy otherwise, or republish, to post on servers or to redistribute to lists, requires prior specific permission and/or a fee. Request permissions from [email protected]

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Association for Computing Machinery

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Publication History

Published: 01 April 2019
Accepted: 01 May 2018
Revised: 01 April 2018
Received: 01 December 2017
Published in TOIT Volume 19, Issue 2

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Author Tags

  1. Computing continuum
  2. Functions-as-a-Service
  3. edge computing
  4. fog computing
  5. mobile computing
  6. ops automation
  7. real-time systems

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  • Research-article
  • Research
  • Refereed

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  • EEB - Edifici A Zero Consumo Energetico In Distretti Urbani Intelligenti (Italian Technology Cluster For Smart Communities)
  • National Council for Scientific and Technological Development (CNPq) - Brazil
  • GAUSS national research project MIUR, PRIN 2015

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