AC 2012-3303: REMOTE EXPERIMENTATION FOR COMMUNICATION: FROM REMOTE DESKTOPS TO GATEWAYS

Mr. Grant Huang, University of Texas, San Antonio Grant Huang received his M.Sc. degree from the University of Texas, San Antonio (UTSA) in 2009 and is currently a Ph.D. student in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering (ECE) at UTSA. His research interests include satellite/wireless channel modeling, Assisted-GPS/GNSS (A-GPS/GNSS), and remote experimentation systems. Andreas Gampe, University of Texas, San Antonio Andreas Gampe is a Ph.D. student at the University of Texas at San Antonio. He received a diploma degree in Computer Science from the Friedrich-Schiller University, Jena, Germany, in 2006. His current research interests include language-based security for computer systems, embedded languages in software engineering, and online education. Mr. Arsen Melkonyan, University of Texas, San Antonio Arsen Melkonyan is a Ph.D. student at the University of Texas, San Antonio. From 2005 to 2007, he was a member of the research staff of Tampere University of Technology, Finland. He received a B.Sc. degree in electrical engineering from the State Technical University of Armenia, Yerevan, Armenia, in 2003 and a M.Sc. degree in electrical engineering from the University of Texas at San Antonio in 2008. His current research interests include impact localization algorithms for structural health monitoring, WLAN Indoor positioning technologies, and remote hardware based educational system design. Dr. Murillo Pontual, University of Texas, San Antonio Murillo Pontual is a Senior Member of the technical staff at Oracle. He received his Ph.D. in computer science from the University of Texas, San Antonio in 2011, and he received his M.Sc. and B.Sc. degrees in computer science from the Federal University of Pernambuco, Brazil, respectively in 2005 and 2003. His current research interests include formal methods, online education technologies, and computer security with special emphasis in access control, security policies, and obligations. Dr. David Akopian, University of Texas, San Antonio David Akopian is an Associate Professor at the University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA). He joined UTSA in 2003 where he founded Software Communication and Navigation Systems Laboratory. He received the M.Sc. degree in radio-electronics from the Moscow Institute of Physics and Technology in 1987 and Ph.D. degree in electrical engineering from the Tampere University of Technology (TUT), Finland, EU, in 1997. From 1999 to 2003, he was a Senior Engineer and Specialist with Nokia Corporation. Prior to joining Nokia in 1999, he was a member of teaching and research staff of TUT. His current research interests include digital signal processing algorithms for communication and navigation receivers, positioning methods and mobile applications, and remote labs

c American Society for Engineering Education, 2012

Remote Experimentation for Communication: from Remote Desktops to Gateways Grant Huang, Andreas Gampe, Arsen Melkonyan, Murillo Pontual, and David Akopian
Abstract With continuous development of information technology and mature communication channels through the Internet, remote labs may potentially overcome many constrains faced in hands-on laboratories (e.g., minimizing expenses, providing flexible lab schedule, and sharing limited resources among multiple students). This paper presents a comparative study among three different remote lab implementation options, which include all the unique solutions used in simple-to-sophisticated system development. The testbed is eComLab, a radio-communication remote laboratory system developed by the authors; it has been used in several courses at the department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, the University of Texas at San Antonio (UTSA). The implementation options are discussed as various evolutional stages of the eComLab, which evolved from a simple single-user remote desktop application to a multi-user system architecture that operates as a gateway connecting four remote sides: (1) PC-controlled experiment, (2) users such as students, (3) instructors and (4) system administrators. In its latest version, users may utilize a regular web-browser to access remote experiments. The system provides various handy functions and enables group work capabilities. The paper also provides intervention data in the classroom through the analysis of surveys collected among students. 1. Introduction Nowadays, laboratories that work with hands-on experiments are among the core components of engineering studies. Hands-on experiments help efficiently digest theoretical concepts and train students to rely on the facts according to physical evidence. On the other hand, high equipment cost and the lack of the necessary maintenance and assistance have led to reduced importance of hand-on laboratories on the curriculum. Software simulators, based on mathematical models, can be an alternative method to replace the traditional hands-on laboratories; however, the valuable pictorial element is removed from the practical learning processes. The continuous progress of information technology combined with the increasing stability of the Internet provides a potential environment for Web-based remote applications. A web-based remote laboratory application can overcome various difficulties and limitations in offering hands-on training (i.e. minimized expenses, flexible times, and resources sharing among

students). Unfortunately, only physical experiments, which have PC-controlled features can be implemented in remote settings, which limit the conceptual applicability of the specific educational areas such as radio-communications. One of the main design challenges is to establish an architecture that can provide adequate access to the remote hardware in the remote laboratory development. Hardware that generates real time signals is the core factor in the remote laboratory architecture, while software is the alternative hardware management component, which provides connection between the user orders and the hardware. In addition, a software layer provides a Graphical User Interface (GUI) where the experiment results can be visualized. The simplest remote laboratory may be a single user, one-by-one experiment that reports feedback data of visualized measurement results from the hardware. Moreover, more sophisticated systems may handle several experiments with different apparatus and manage multiple user accesses. Currently, several academic institutions provide different Internet-based laboratories (e.g. AIM-Lab [1], ReLOAD at University of Leeds [2], and remote lab at UTS [3]) with different physical experiments from various topics of engineering. In AIM-Lab, the user (client) connects to the experiment to control the hardware with proprietary software. This proprietary software plays an intermittent role between the experiment and the user. As for the scopes of the system infrastructure, ReLOAD has been designed as a gateway server, which connects multiple experiments with the central management server through the Internet by LabVIEW web server with a static IP address. However, the system architecture in UTS lab integrates central management server and experiments with isolated interfaces by utilizing virtual machines. Virtual machines are located in the central management server, which is considered as experiment PCs connected to experiment hardware. The discussed remote labs have GUI features to assist the users. For example, the UTS lab provides video streaming and chat function in the experiments, while the ReLOAD supports the video feature only. The eComLab systems architecture has been developed in three generations (simple-to-sophisticated) conventional remote desktop, server-centric, and server as the gateway architectures. In this paper, we present the technological solutions used in each eComLab generation. Each eComLab generation development has been driven from the previous generations defects. During the development, we had to come up with several solutions to overcome these defects. All these solutions are presented in further sections. The latest generation of eComLab is based on the gateway architecture, which connects multiple instructors, experimental equipment, and users from different locations via Internet.

The GUI of the current eComLab platform includes several handy features, which help users interact (chat rooms) and monitor the hardware with real-time video stream through the motorized Web-camera. The eComLab uses the NI ELVIS [4] /DATEx [5] telecommunications bundle as the hardware-based experimental equipment. eComLab is a very flexible platform, and it is capable to connect new educational experiments (hardware laboratories) directly to a gateway (central) server, or from remote locations. This platform allows multiple users to access and operate with the same experiment simultaneously by following two parallel (the queue and the group policy) methods. Finally, the eComLab is accessible through a regular Web-browser with Java and Flash plug-ins, which eliminates the necessity to install any additional hardware driver in the user computer. The detailed information about the different eComLab generations is discussed in the following sections. 2. First Generation of eComLabConventional Remote Desktop 2.1 Architecture The first generation of eComLab [6] is based on a straightforward system architecture that uses conventional remote desktop application (Teamviewer [7]) to connect the users to the experiments. The host computer known as the experiment server is attached to the hardware equipment (NI ELVIS/DATEx). It contains all the necessary software components (NI ELVISE and DATEx SFP) to control the hardware and monitor the results on the host machine. Figure 1 shows the system architecture of the first generation eComLab. The first generation of the eComLab is based on one-by-one communication system architecture. Multiple requests are treated with the first-in-first-out queuing policy, parallel connections are not supported. 2.2 Graphical User Interface (GUI) Figure 2 is a snapshot of the first generation eComLabs GUI. In this architecture, eComLab uses the TeamViewer as the remote desktop software.

Fig. 1. Hardware-based system architecture of remote desktop experiments

The ope eration syste em of the ex xperiment s server is Wi indows XP professiona al edition. Security polices built in Win ndows XP have h been u used to secu ure the host computer b by granting the t users ac ccess only to the specif fic list of so oftware.

Fig. 2. The first g generation of eComLab GU UI

Once th he users con nnect to the host/experi iment machine, they ha ave complet te control ov ver the experim ment-related d software. They T can m manipulate hardware-ba h sed experim ments remot tely. Connec ction is estab blished usin ng TeamVie ewer with th heir corresponding ID a and passwo ord. In addition n, Teamview wer has several handy b built-in fun nctions (e.g. chat and fil le transfer), , which can be u used during g the remote e experimen nt. 2.2 Syst tem Review w The rem mote desktop architectu ure has been n designed as a a one-by-one commu unication sc cheme, so the f first-in-first-out queuing g policy is a applied to th he concurre ent connecti ions when multiple m users re equest to acc cess the exp periment. U Under this ar rchitecture, users canno ot collabora ate with other us sers to exec cute tasks in n groups. Qu ueued users have no inf formation fo for how long g he/she needs to o wait for th he experime ent. Besides s, users are required r to install the a additional re emote desktop p software in n order to connect to th he hardware e attached ex xperiment s server. 3. Second Gener ration of eC ComLabC Centric Ser rver 3.1 Arc chitecture The sec cond genera ation of the eComLab e w was designe ed to address s the defect ts of the firs st generation reported d by the stu udents. It is a multi-user r system based on a cen ntralized sy ystem architec cture.

In this c centralized architecture e ([8] and [9 9]) shown in n Figure 3, the t central s server conta ains several virtual mac chines, whic ch are indep pendent hos st computers s and severa al server manage ement softw ware. It is running Ubun ntu Linux to o provide th he Web inter rface from an a Apache e HTTP serv ver, a MYSQ QL databas se for storag ge, and a Re ed 5 for strea aming real-time video. E Each virtual l machine connected to o the experim ment machi ine is attach hed to exper riment hardwar re equipmen nt with all necessary n so oftware inst talled to ope erate the har ardware.

Fig. . 3. Server-Ce entric architecture

Additio onally, a use er managem ment program m installed on o the centr ral server si ide is conne ected to the UTS SA Blackbo oard user da atabase, whi ich simplifies the system access fo or the studen nts. UTSA s students do not need to o have extra a login infor rmation to lo og in to the eComLab. They simply use their log in information from t the Blackbo oard. After signing in th he system, the t centric server redir rects users to t the corres sponding vi irtual machi ine by creati ting the link k between n the user an nd the selec cted experim ment from th he experime ent list. The num mber of virt tual machin nes that the c central serv ver can host depends on n several fac ctors: network k bandwidth h, experime ental equipm ments, central server ha ardware con nstarints (e.g g., memory y size, processor speed d, etc.) The e eComLab has h three vir rtual machin nes with ELVIS/ /Emona DA ATEx experi iment traine er for comm muncation ex xperiments attached. The T system was serving g a wireless s communic cation class with 25 students. 3.2 Gra aphical Use er Interface e (GUI) The sec cond genera ation of the eComLab e is s an advanc ced system with w a user friendly GU UI [9]. The sys stem can be accessed by using any y regular We eb browser, , which mak kes third part softwar res on user machines m un nnecessary. The remote e experimen nt room in s second gene eration eComL Lab is shown n in Figure 4. 4 The eCo omLab GUI provides several s hand dy functions. One of th he main syst tem functionalities is a mul ltiuser supp port. The use ers are able to log in th he same exp periment con ncurrently.

Howeve er, only one e user can control the e experiment, while the others o can ob bserve it. The system manage the e rotation of f the users. T The users can monitor their experi iment contr rol time or the p position in th he queue th hrough the st tatus bar. The T students have the op ption to dec crease the qual lity of the im mage that is s being tran nsmitted by the remote desktop thr rough the co ontrol bar; this s is particul larly useful to overcom me the bandw width constr raints. Final lly, users ca an observe e the experim ment hardw ware through h the real-tim me video transmission,, and comm municate with eac ch other thr rough the ch hat room.

Fig. 4. The GUI o of second gen neration eCom mLab

3.3 Syst tem Review w In this g generation, eComLab has h graduall ly improved d. A new central system m architectu ure was built. U Users could access a the system s by a simple Web browser; no extra sof ftware was required d in the user side. Mult tiple users c could execu ute multiples s experimen nts at the sa ame time. In addit tion, users could c comm municate wit th each othe er through a chat room,, and all the e video of the e experiments were transm mitted in a r real time fa ashion. Althoug gh, the response collect ted from the e users were very posit tive. Some u users asked d for some ot ther features, among th hem, such as s experimen nt control sw witch functi ion among the t users w without the queuing q con nstraints, cam mera contro ol (i.e. zoom m in, zoom o out and chan nge the video st treaming an ngle), and a dedicated g general disc cussion boar rd for all use ers. 4. Cur rrent Gene eration of eC ComLab Gateway Server S 4.1 Arc chitecture The late est version of o eComLab b is the com mbination of f the central l server and d server as gateway g architec ctures. The central serv ver can eithe er host expe eriment mac chine or con nnect experi iment machines located in remote lo ocations thro ough the net twork. The gateway se erver archite ecture,

shown i in Figure 5, , connects four fo remote sides through the Inter rnet: PC-con ntrolled exp periment, students s, instructor rs, and syste em administ trators. Like in the previou us generatio on, users of t the last vers sion of eComLab utiliz zes a regular Web browser r to access the t system. All the We eb pages are e coded in PHP using M MySQL data abase. The rem mote desktop applet utilizes a mod dified versio on of the open source ti ight VNC [1 10]. The video st treaming ap pplication is s based on a modified Red R 5 [11] player p versio on written in i flash.

Fig. 5. G Gateway Server architecture

4.2 Gr raphical Us ser Interfac ce (GUI) Differen nt users acc cess differen nt GUI. The e system red directs users s to the corr responding GUI using th he sophisticated user management m application n after verify fying their cr credentials. Student ts can only access a the experiment e l list, corresp ponding mat terials, surv veys, and ge eneral discussi ion board, while w instru uctors are ab ble to manag ge experime ents such as s adding or editing the expe eriments, se etting the ex xperiments t time and gr roup size, an nd uploadin ng or editing g experim ment materia als, surveys s, and questi ionnaires. 4.2.1 St tudent Inte erface Once a student log gs in the eCo omLab, he/s she can cho oose the pref ferred exper riment from m the experim ment list. Th he main win ndow of the student inte erface is sho own in Figu ure 6. In the e main window w of student t interface, the t students s have acces ss to the thre ee main sys stem interfaces: menu, e experiment list, and dis scussion boa ard. With th he help of th he menu bar r, students are a able to navig gate within the eComLab system. It allows th he user to go o back or for orward from m the main W Web page to the contacts, the surve ey, the material area, the discussion n wall, and the

experim ment area. The T user can n log off from m the system anytime by using th he logout bottom located in the menu u bar.

Fig. 6. Main menu of Stud dent Interface

urvey sectio on, students s can compl lete a short survey, whi ich helps de evelopers to o collect In the su user fee edback abou ut the system m in order t to improve it. i Experime ental materi ials and tuto orial in text or v video forma at are availa able in the m material area a. In additio on, students s are able to see the list of e experiments in the expe eriments are ea. The eCo omLab defin nes the expe eriment statu us through h special im mage figures, , which are shown in th he status column. It inf forms user that t the experim ment is free, and it is av vailable for full use if no n other user is in the v virtual exper riment room. T The system can also notify the user r about wha at experiment is being u used and wh hether the user r can join th he group as an observer r. When the e maximum number of users for an n experim ment is reach hed, the eCo omLab auto omatically blocks b acces ss to the exp periment. The discussion wal ll in the stud dent interfa ace allows st tudents to post p commen ents or quest tions for a public c view, whic ch can be an nswered or further com mmented by y all users, in ncluding instruct tors and oth her students. Besdies, th he eComLab b provides individual i w walls for all the experim ments. The wall w link on n the right ha and side of each experi iment (Fig.6 6) correspon nds to

the disc cussion wall l. The system automati ically chang ges the discu ussion wall located und der the experim ment list onc ce a user po oints to the w wall link. After ch hoosing an experiment, a user acce esses the ex xperiment ar rea that incl ludes the re emote desktop p application n, the real ti ime video, t the chat roo om, the statu us and the c control bars as shown i in Figure 7. The remote desktop ap application is i an applet that allows students to o control the expe eriment rem motely. This s applet peri iodically co ommunicates with the m main central l server to check k which stu udent has the e right to co ontrol the ex xperiment, how h many u users are in the experim ment room, and a automa atically upda ates the user queue. No ote that the s system allow ws only one stud dent to have e control ov ver an exper riment at a time. t However, other st tudents in the virtual e experiment room can observe o the experiment t, the hardw ware from re eal-time vide eo streamin ng, and disc cuss with ot thers using the built-in chat room.

Fig. 7. The t third generatio on of GUI

The stat tus bar, loca ated under the t remote d desktop app plication, sh hows the rem maining exp periment time for r the main user, u and the e user positi ion in the queue q with th he remainin ng time to gain g experim ment control l for the oth her users. The con ntol bar is composed of f four icons at the botto om, next to the status b bar. They pr rovide several additional useful u funct tions: remot te desktop transmission t n rate contro ol, quality refresh, r full scre een mode, and a passing experiment t control to another use er. The last t two functio ons were implem mented in ord der to fix th he problems s that were reported r fro om generatio on two by the t users. Full scr reen mode was w designe ed in order t to present th he users a bi igger worki ing area. Th he experim ment control l passing function allow ws a user to o pass the co ontrol of a e experiment to t another r users, in a way that a group of us sers can coll laborate to execute e an e experiment together r.

4.2.2 In nstructor In nterface The instructors GU UI has been n designed t to manage th he eComLa ab remotely.. The instru uctor can manage e the experim ments, acad demic mater rials, users, and surveys through a Web brows ser applicat tion. Figure e 8 shows th he instructor r interface's s main Web page. Most t importantl ly, instruct tors can set up new exp periments or r edit the old ones, set up u the numb ber of stude ents in the expe eriment gro oup, define the t list of st tudent name es authorize ed to access an experim ment, and the set the experiment dur ration. Instr ructors also have access s to set up a physical experim ment server such as hardware and c camera setti ings. Instruc ctors can al lso upload or o edit tutorials s and videos in the academic mate erial area. In the u user area, the instructor r is able to m manage user rs such as cr reate or dele ete users, ed dit user passwor rds, and dec cide whethe er a user is g goint to be in i the role of o a student or an instru uctor. The instructor can also post messages m to s students in the wall are ea, and can r repply private messages left by st tudents thro ough the con ntacts functi ion.

Fig. 8. Adm ministration in nterface

4.3 Syst tem Review w The cur rrent version n of the eCo omLab has improved th he defects th hat arose in n previous tw wo versions, and it off fers several additional f functions (i.e. experiment control passing, ful ll screen, camera control but ttons, and ad dministratio on interface). The signi ificant impr rovement of f the current system is th he usage of f a central se erver as a ga atway, whic ch connects PC-control lled experim ment, studen nts, instructo ors, and sys stem admini istrators from remote lo ocations thr rough the Inte ernet. 5. eCo omLab Que estionnaire e Results As desc cribed in the e introductio on, eComLa ab has passed by three generations s: the conve entional remote desktop, the central server, and th he gateway server. s All the t three ge enerations have h been of ffered in the e Communic cation class ses for both undergradu uate and gra aduate levels s at the departm ment of Elec ctrical and Computer C E Engineering since 2008. In [8], our r previous works w in

a radio-communica ation domai in with peda agogic conc cerns have shown s that s students can n have a better u understandin ng of the course after h hands-on exp periments. We W have pr resented feedback question nnaires for each differe ent version of e-Comla ab in a way to t evaluate and improv ve the system. The survey y questions have a five e-level Liker rt scale from m Strongly y Disagree to Strong gly Agree, which corre esponds to t the answer options. Th he minimum m score is on ne and the max ximum scor re is five. Th he questions s are classif fied into three categorie es: usability y, usefulness, and acc ceptance. Chart 1 summarize es survey results (mean n value) con nducted amo ong the 97 u undergradua ate and 34 grad duate studen nts. The thre ee eComLab b generation ns are noted d as first (F) ), second(S) ), and Third (T T). Chart 2 shows the correspondi c ing standard d deviation for f three eC ComLab generations.

Cha art 1. Summa arized survey r results (mean value) for three eComLab g generation

The me ean values of o the usabi ility catego ory for the first f generati ion is MV= =3.78 (F) an nd for second generation is MV=3.81 (S). As th he results de emonstrate in i this categ gory, the stu udents feedbac cks have pos sitively incr reased over r the develop pment stage es of the eC ComLab. All l the GUI im mprovements s, which we ere done bas sed on stude ents feedba acks, made the eComL Lab a more us ser-friend sy ystem (MV=4.26 (T)). Similar to usabilit ty category y, the results s of the use efulness are e also increa ased from one o generation to anoth her. The me ean value of f survey resu ults in usef fulness cate egory are MV=3.82 (F), MV V=3.82 (S) and a MV=3.9 96 (T). Simi ilar results are a obtained d for the accepta ance category MV=3.86 (F), MV V=3.91 (S) and a MV=4.0 02 (T). The results in th his categories show that all the im mprovement ts over the developmen d nt stages ma ade the eCom mLab very use eful and in general acc ceptable syst tem. The stan ndard devia ations of the e usability (SD=0.96 (F), SD=0.95 (S) and SD=0.85 (T T)), usefuln ness (SD= =1.01 (F), SD D=0.97 (S) and SD=0.9 95 (T)), and d acceptanc ce (SD=1.17 (F),

SD=1.0 09 (S) and SD=1.07 S (T) )) are decrea ased from one o generati ion to anoth her. The resu ults show th hat the numb ber of stude ents who an nswer positiv vely to the survey s ques stions has in ncreased over the e eComLab developme ent generatio ons. General lly, the stud dents feedb backs have i improved fr rom one gen neration to a another. It also a demons strates that the t system improvemen i nts based on n the user fe eedbacks w were success sful, which increased th he users interest in the eComLab. Besides the e sophisticat ted system architec cture, the eC ComLab wa as turned int to a user-fri iendly and useful u system m, which ca an success sfully replac ce the traditi ional hands s-on laborato ories.

Chart 2. Stan ndard Deviatio on for three generation of eComLab e

nclusion 6. Con This pa aper has pres sented the different d gen nerations of f eComLab, , in terms of f architectur re, GUI platform m, and peda agogical sur rvey concern ns. In the cu urrent versio on, eComLa ab has been n implem mented as a gateway g ser rver to conn nect instruct tors, student ts, and expe eriment serv vers from remote locations. It has successfully s y dedicated the GUI pla atform with h computer-like remote experiment ts without re equiring any y additional l software or o hardware-based driver installat tions on the e user side. All A the thre e generation ns has been n successfull ly tested sin nce 2008 in n the commu unication classes at the e University y of Texas at t San Anton nio. Finally, , pedagogical surveys collected c fro om students s show an im mprovemen nt from gene eration to gener ration of the e eComlab. Furthermor re, this wor rk shows tha at remote la aboratories, like eComla ab, are viabl le alternativ ve to the trad ditional han nds-on labor ratories at le east in radio o commu unication do omain, which may optim mally utilize e limited resources and d provide fle exibility to the st tudents in th he sense of time and lo ocation.

References
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