PERFORMANCE MONITOR, EVALUATION AND DIAGNOSIS SYSTEM FOR WIRELESS SENSOR NETWORKS

• US 20140362711A1
• Filed: 06/11/2013
• Published: 12/11/2014
• Est. Priority Date: 06/11/2013
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Jiang, Jin, Quan Wang
• Original Assignee: Jiang, Jin, Quan Wang
• Inventors: Jiang, Jin, Wang, Quan
• Granted Patent: US 9,473,954 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 370/252
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/02 Arrangements for optimising operational condition
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 24/04 Arrangements for maintaining operational condition
• CPC Class Codes: H04W 84/18 Self-organising networks, e.g. ad-hoc networks or sensor networks

Abstract

A method of evaluating and diagnosing performance of an operating wireless sensor network without disturbing or burdening the network is disclosed. The operating wireless sensor network includes a plurality of operational nodes. A system, which comprises a plurality of detecting nodes and a performance evaluation and diagnosis platform, is provided in order to implement the present method. After time synchronization, the detecting node is connected with an operational node. After the detecting node estimates MAC or network layer address of its corresponding operational node, it will capture any transmission of or around the operational node, and upload captured packets to the evaluation and diagnosis platform. The evaluation and diagnosis platform produce a report by analyzing the acquired information from all detecting nodes.

Claims

1. A wireless sensor network (WSN) monitor system, comprising:

one or more detecting nodes, each detecting node including (i) means for time synchronizing with other detecting nodes in the WSN monitor system;

(ii) means for acquiring an identification of at least one operational node of the WSN;

(iii) means for capturing signals transmitted to and from the identified operational nodes of the WSN; and

(iv) means for adding an identifier to the captured signals to form a recorded message.

2. The system of claim 1, wherein the system further comprises a performance evaluation and diagnosis platform having (i) means for receiving the recorded messages from the one or more detecting nodes;

and (ii) means for evaluating the performance and diagnosis of the WSN based on the recorded messages.

3. The system of claim 2, wherein each detecting node further includes (v) means for uploading the recorded message to the performance evaluation and diagnosis platform.

4. The system of claim 1, wherein said means for capturing information transmitted to and from the at least one identified operational node of the WSN is an antenna.

5. The system of claim 1, wherein the one or more detecting node is linked to the at least one operational node through an RF connector to share an antenna.

6. The system of claim 1, wherein said means for adding an identifier includes a time synchronization module for adding a time reference to the captured information.

7. The system of claim 1, wherein said identifier includes one or more of an address of the identified operational nodes, a time reference and a link quality field.

8. The system of claim 1, wherein the identification of the operational nodes is a MAC or network layer address.

9. The system of claim 2, wherein said performance evaluation and diagnosis platform includes a recorded message input unit, a preprocess unit, a data storage unit performance evaluation unit, a diagnosis unit, and an output unit.

10. The system of claim 2, wherein said performance evaluation and diagnosis platform Includes:

a recorded message input unit which is operated to receive recorded messages respectively from each detecting node, a preprocess unit which classifies and aggregates the input recorded messages, a data storage unit which stores the processed recorded messages input from the preprocessed unit, a performance evaluation unit having one or more sub-units having evaluating performance measurement means, a diagnosis unit which diagnoses and identify location of faults or causes for degraded performance, a display unit which shows results from both performance evaluation unit and diagnosis unit.

11. The system of claim 1, wherein the means (i)-(iv) of the detecting node are automatic Means.

12. A method of monitoring the performance of a WSN of operational nodes, said method operable on a computing device having a processor and memory, and comprising:

(a) deploying one or more detecting nodes substantially proximal to the operational nodes, such that each detecting node captures signals to and from at least one corresponding operational node;

(b) if two or more detecting nodes are deployed, time synchronizing the two or more detecting nodes;

(c) each detecting node acquiring an identification of its corresponding at least one operational node;

(d) the one or more detecting nodes capturing the signals to and from their identified at least one operational node;

(e) adding to the captured signal with one or more identifiers to form a recorded message; and

(f) using the recorded messages to monitor the performance of the WSN system.

13. The method of claim 12, wherein step (b) precedes step (a).

14. The method of claim 12, wherein the identifier includes one or more of a time reference, a node identification field and a link quality field to the recorded message.

15. The method of claim 12, wherein the method further includes the deployed one or more detecting nodes acquiring an address of the corresponding connected operational node, and wherein step (d)further includes adding said address to the recorded message.

16. The, method of claim 12, wherein step (f) comprises uploading the recorded message to a performance evaluation and diagnosis platform.

17. The method of claim 16, wherein said uploading is done in real time or after a pre-defined time period.

18. The method of claim 16, wherein the method further includes arranging the operational nodes of the WSN based on the performance evaluation and diagnosis of the recorded messages.

19. The method of claim 12, wherein one or more of the steps in the method is automatic.

20. A WSN detecting node comprising:

(a) means for time synchronization with one or more detecting nodes;

(b) means for acquiring an identification of thee operational node (c) means for capturing signals to and from the identified operational node of the WSN, and (d) means for adding an identifier to the captured signals to form a recorded message.

21. The WSN detecting node of claim 20, wherein the means for adding an identifier includes means for adding a time reference to the signals.

22. The WSN detecting node of claim 20, wherein the means for adding an identifier includes means for adding the operational node'"'"'s identification field to the signals.

23. The WSN detecting node of claim 20, wherein the rears for adding an identifier includes means for adding a link quality field to the signals.

24. The WSN detecting node of claim 20, wherein the WSN detecting node further includes means for uploading the recorded message to an analyzer.