The Salutation Consortium continues to move forward. We have joined the Infrared data Association (IrDA) as a vehicle to promote our IrDA implementation. To demonstrate our support for and usefulness in the wireless environment, we will be working with Bluetooth at COMDEX and the Bluetooth Developers Conference. We will also be at PalmSource showing our Salutation-Lite implementation.

We have made it even easier for individuals and organizations to join the Consortium. We have added two new membership levels that are free to qualifying applicants. We have added a membership grant that provides a reduction in membership fees to organizations that provide Salutation implementations to the Consortium that can be shared with other members. And soon, you will be able to register for membership on-line.

We're making the Salutation Architecture more accessible. Not only can you download the Salutation Specification royalty free, but members will have access to the Salutation-Lite beta source code. This code will be made available on an open source model when beta testing is completed.

The Salutation ConsortiumÔ announced the addition of two new membership levels and the opportunity for grant funding.

The new academic level is now available for individuals at academic or research institutes who have an interest in the consortium's charter. This will provide an opportunity for researchers to influence the development of the Salutation Architecture and allow the Salutation Consortium to become better known in a broader research environment. Membership is free. However, academic members are not allowed to vote on consortium business or hold a board seat.

The honorary membership level may be exchanged with other standards organizations or consortiums. Cost of membership is an equal membership level from the interested organization. Honorary members do not hold voting rights nor can they hold a board seat.

The consortium also announced the availability of a membership grant. Existing consortium members and companies interested in becoming members can apply for a one-time grant of $5,000 to be applied against membership fees. The member company must contribute real property to the consortium that can be freely distributed on the Salutation web site. Some examples include Salutation tester software or beta code supporting the Salutation Protocol.

"We understand the need to reach all interested parties in order to achieve true standards acceptance," said Robert Pascoe, president of the Salutation Consortium. "The success of a standard service discovery technology is dependent upon support from both commercial concerns as well as research and academia."

The Salutation Consortium currently offers two other membership levels. Core membership is $50,000 annually, offering both voting rights and a board seat. General membership costs $5,000 annually and provides early access to, and design influence on the Salutation technology.

The Salutation-LiteÔ project, announced in April, is creating a compact implementation of the Salutation Architecture for Windows CE and Palm OS. It is intended to show the value of the Salutation Architecture in mobile devices.

The Salutation-Lite Beta Test Program is about to start. Members of the Consortium may register as beta testers and will receive beta level source code for use in their implementations. Send an e-mail to [email protected] if you are interested in participating in the beta program.

Dr. Tamel Bose has joined the Consortium as its first Academic member. Dr. Bose is a tenured Associate Professor of Electrical Engineering at the University of Colorado at Denver. He has published over seventy papers in various journals and conference proceedings on the topics of digital signal processing, communications, and multidimensional systems theory. He holds two patents and several research awards. He has also been the recipient of numerous research grants and contracts, including a recent one dealing with Embedded Java Technology. Dr. Bose has expressed interest in a Java version of Salutation-Lite.

The Consortium has been working with the Bluetooth Special Interest Group to assure consistency with service discovery protocols. As a result, a white paper has been published showing how Salutation can be used in the Bluetooth environment. The white paper may be downloaded from the Salutation website at http://www.salutation.org/whitepaper/BtoothMapping.PDF.

The Salutation Consortium has joined the Infrared Data Association (IrDA). "With the first rollout of the Salutation-Lite on IrDA technologies, it is only natural that we support the Association's efforts," said Robert Pascoe, Consortium President. An Application Note on use of Salutation in the IrDA environment has been submitted and is in the IrDA review process. Read more on this in the TechTalk section of this issue of GREETINGS!

The Salutation Consortium is forming a workgroup to study technical implications of blending mobile technologies with traditional Office needs. Mobile devices such as laptop, palm-top and hand-held computers give us a wide range of mobility while staying connected to our information base. Yet, as connected as these technologies allow us to be, mobile users still find themselves isolated from the basic functions of print, fax and scan.

The Salutation Mobility Workgroup will study ways to move information in and out of your information base from devices you might find in a storefront copy center or hotel business center. The goal is to assure Salutation Technologies will allow the mobile worker to Find-and-BindÔ with a device or service that best suits the workers needs. If you are interested in learning more about this workgroup, contact [email protected].  Also see the Scenarios section in this issue of GREETINGS!

Why do individuals, companies, corporations, or organizations become members of the Salutation Consortium? The answer is that they join the consortium because membership provides numerous opportunities to help them meet their individual and mutual business objectives. These opportunities exist for companies and organizations from all segments of the information technology industry, having a diverse range of products and services. The current list of members includes companies that manufacture hardware, develop system and application software, provide networking solutions, deliver services, and market a variety of related commercial and consumer products.

Becoming a member of the Salutation Consortium will give you the opportunity to be part of a leading-edge technology organization that develops and promotes open standards for interoperability and information exchange. The consortium creates technologies to support an interoperable, low-cost, data interchange model that is adaptable to a wide range of networked applications, devices and services.

Member companies are looking after their best interest when they participate in Consortium’s process of jointly creating and influencing an open service discovery protocol technology that meets their own requirements as well as the needs of the consortium, and the industry as a whole.

The consortium provides an excellent functioning environment for your company to develop business relationships with other leading edge companies and their people. The consortium’s working groups, board meetings and continual communications create ongoing opportunities to establish mutually beneficial business relationships. Salutation Consortium members have entered into shared development projects, product testing arrangements, joint marketing activities, and other types of associations that have lead to improved business results.

The Salutation Consortium generates a continuing stream of publicity that member companies can leverage, including press releases, newspaper and magazine articles, newsletters, white papers, trade shows, industry conferences, and web page postings.   

As a non-profit organization, the Salutation Consortium can pass on to its members, education and seminars, development/testing tools and aids, and discounts on products and services that are not available to non-members companies. These can provide your company with a financial advantage in the market place. Some of these products and offerings are made available at no cost. Member companies also receive earlier access to products and offerings that can equate to additional competitive advantages. You can learn more about what’s available on the Salutation web page (www.salutation.org).

The Salutation Consortium offers four membership levels.

·        Core membership- Includes voting rights and a board seat ($50,000 annual cost).

·        General membership- Provides early access to and design influence on the Salutation technology ($5,000 annual cost).

·        Academic membership- Facilitates input to the Salutation technology development process (Free to individuals at academic or research institutes)

·        Honorary membership- Provides free membership to a standards organization or consortium in exchange for an equal level membership at that organization.

The consortium also recently announced the availability of a one-time membership grant of $5,000 that can be applied against membership fees for organizations that contribute real property to the consortium that can be freely distributed on the Salutation web site.

The advantages of Salutation Membership include:

·        Impacting the future of the networked digital office and pervasive computing by actively working on setting strategies, developing technologies, and influencing industry standards.

·        Establishing valuable contacts at leading edge companies within the consortium that are working to solve today’s interoperability problems.

·        Joining an effort that is recognized internationally by the information processing industry, and interacting with other international member companies that are actively participating in the process of developing and enhancing the Salutation architecture and technologies.

·        Participating in Salutation’s marketing and promotional programs that are designed to create visibility and recognition of the Salutation logo.

·        Taking advantage of the opportunity to promote your company, corporation, or organization in Salutation sponsored press releases, literature, web pages, newsletters, advertisements, and trade shows.

 I have given you some ideas on ways that your company or organization can benefit from being a member of the Salutation Consortium. If you're not a member, please take the time to investigate how Salutation can specifically benefit you and your organization. If you have questions, need more information, or would like to arrange a meeting, contact me at [email protected].

In each issue of Greetings! the “Salutation Scenarios�Esection highlights potential uses for the Salutation Architecture.  We aim to prod your thinking as you visualize how Salutation might benefit your business.  First we’ll describe how someone might use Salutation‑enabled products and services to solve a problem, then we’ll take the covers off and show you how Salutation technology made the scenario possible.

As a top salesman for a clothing manufacturer, Toby has zeroed in on three key tactics that enable him to close deals with the buyers at the major department stores that he visits. First, he presents his clients with up-to-the-minute information on his product line. Second, he tailors his presentation to the immediate needs of each buyer. And finally, before the meeting closes he provides his client a printed proposal customized to the client’s requirements.

Toby’s road warrior arsenal includes a hand-held mobile computer and a digital wireless phone. The fact that these devices are equipped with Bluetooth and Infrared wireless technologies has added a new dimension to Toby’s work -- database connectivity and local print-on-demand. These functions enable him to stay connected with his clients and his database, a capability that can simplify data and service access for all traveling businesspeople.

While traveling from the last sales call to the next, Toby phones ahead to discuss requirements with the buyer, Cindy Brown. With his hand-held connected through his digital phone to the corporate data base (Figure 1), Toby manipulates the product line to meet the buyer’s requirements, retrieving the most recent information on those garments that are in line with the client’s needs. Toby builds a specialized database designed for this next sales call, then logs-off.

Figure 1: Hand-held computer connected to data base server through digital phone

Before calling on his client, Ms. Brown, Toby goes to the nearest commercial business center. He connects to the corporate computer with his digital phone. Using the phone’s keypad, he accesses the special database he created earlier and requests that it be printed (Figure 2). Using the phone’s built-in, Bluetooth wireless technology, the host computer negotiates with each of the different printing and multifunction devices located inside the business center, trying to find one that supports color and is not currently busy. After the device is selected, the digital phone automatically negotiates with the business center’s administrative computer to reserve printing time and make the necessary billing arrangements.

Finally, Toby’s corporate host computer automatically negotiates with the device, acquiring the necessary information to enable the host to format the print job according to the device-specific characteristics. Once the negotiation is complete, the host activates the formatting process and printing begins. Since the printing device supports color, collation, and binding, a professional-looking document is created on the fly.^[1] The result is a sales catalog customized for the clients needs.

Figure 2: Negotiating and connecting data base server to business center printing devices

While waiting for the print out, Toby reviews the client profiles that he maintains on his hand-held computer. He notices that Ms. Brown likes tennis, has two small children, and prefers Chinese food. With this information in mind, Toby aims his hand-held at the business center’s public infrared port and he brings up the community yellow pages (Figure 3). Toby types in “Five star Chinese restaurant�Eand hits “Enter�E Several seconds later, a map appears, showing his location and the location of several restaurants. Toby smiles, and then saves the map.

Figure 3: Connecting to the Community Information Server with Infrared

 Closing the Deal

When Toby arrives at his meeting with his client, he is able to present Ms. Brown with a full-color product catalog customized to meet her needs. Impressed, Ms. Brown decides to make several purchases. After they discuss the terms of the sale, Toby uses the gathered information to process a formal bid with his hand-held computer. He quickly modifies the standard contract stored on the hand-held, entering the proper product codes, volumes and delivery requirements. Toby then asks Ms. Brown if he could use one of her company’s printing devices. She takes him down the hall to a fax machine that doubles as a printer. Using the infrared link between his hand-held and the fax machine, Toby directs this custom prepared contract to the fax machine’s print station. Toby now has a ‘custom-printed�Ebid to leave with the client. No delays! Real time sales!

 Toby then says to the client, “I know a great little Chinese restaurant not to far from here. Let’s do lunch.�E/font>

Salutation may be implemented on IrDA through the Windows Socket interface. This month’s “Tech Talk�Edescribes this technique.

Relationship of Software

Figure 4 shows the relationship of the Salutation ManagerÔ with the IrDA Stack and associated applications. This diagram is identical for both client and server implementations. The Salutation Manager, equipped with a transport manager specific to the IrDA protocol stack, is accessed by the application through the Salutation API. The Salutation Manager sends and receives Salutation Protocol over IrDA through the Windows Socket interface. The following sections will describe the interchange between these components.

Figure 4: Relationship of Salutation Manager to the IrDA Protocol Stack using unique Transport Manager

Initialization

When each Salutation Manager is initialized, it starts the IrDA Transport Manager. The Transport Manager calls the IRSocket “socket()�EAPI to build an IR socket. Through the sockets interface, the Transport Manager on the server binds to the socket, sets the IrDA transceiver in listen mode and sets the transceiver to accept any inbound transmissions.

Salutation Manager ID Exchange

The Transport Manager on the client and service devices performs the function of searching for other devices and determining if these devices are Salutation-enabled.

Using the SetSocketOpt(IAS_SET) call, the service’s Transport Manager sets a Salutation Manager Identifier (SLM-ID) in the IAS registry of the IrDA stack. The IAS_SET structure values are set as follows:

    irdaClassName = "SLM"

                irdaAttribName = "SLM-ID"

                irdaAttribType = 0x00000001

                irdaAttribute.irdaAttribInt = an integer specifying an SLM-ID unique to the device

The Salutation Architecture Specification defines the SLM-ID for IrDA as the "IrLAP device address (4 octets), followed by a random value through the 16th octet". Although the IrLAP device address is not universally unique, the SLM-ID should be unique in practice considering the mobile nature of the IrDA protocol and the sufficiently long (11 octets) random value.

The client's Transport Manager searches for other devices using the command loop:

            GetSocketOpt(IRLMP_ENUMDEVICES)

When successful, the GetSocketOpt command returns a list of responding devices. The client device's Transport Manager then uses a GetSockOpt(IAS_QUERY) to determine if the found devices are Salutation enabled. If they are Salutation enabled it also discovers the values of their SLM-IDs.

The client’s Transport Manager builds a correlation table between the SLM-ID and the .irdaDeviceID. The client’s Transport Manager is responsible for converting requests to a SLM_ID specific to a .irdaDeviceID.

Finally, the Transport Manager issues a IRSockets connect() command to each of the found Salutation-enabled devices. This causes a new socket handle to be generated on each of the service devices, which in turn establishes an IrDA link between the client and one or more service devices. The Transport Managers maintain this link.

Capability Search

The rest of the interactions between devices take place through the Salutation Manager via the Salutation APIs

To establish the capabilities of Functional Units contained on the device, a service application uses the slmRegisterCapabilities() call. The service’s Salutation Manager holds this information and compares it to requests for service received over the IrDA interface.

Client applications use the slmSearchCapabilities() call to determine the SLM-ID of devices meeting the search criteria defined by the application. Search criteria are specified through one or more Functional Unit Description Records contained in the slmSearchCapabilities() call. The client Salutation Manager packages this request into a QUERY_CAPABILITIES Salutation Protocol command and sends it, via an IRSockets send() command, to all identified Salutation-enabled devices.

Each receiving device compares the attributes of the received Functional Unit Description Record(s) with the Functional Unit descriptions registered there. This comparison is performed via an algorithm specified in the Salutation Architecture Specification. If there is a positive compare, the service Salutation Manager packages its response in a QUERY_RESPONSE Salutation Protocol response and sends this to the client device in an IRSockets send() command. Using the correlation table, the client Transport Manager maps the positive response to an SLM-ID which is returned to the application in response to the slmSearchCapabilities() call, and passes the resulting information through the Salutation manager to the client.

Capability Query

Client applications use the slmQueryCapabilities() call to determine the specific capabilities of one of the service devices. The client specifies which device by specifying an SLM-ID. Search criteria are again specified through one or more Functional Unit Description Records contained in the slmQueryCapabilities() call. The client Salutation Manager packages this request into a QUERY_CAPABILITIES Salutation Protocol command. The client’s Transport Manager correlates the SLM-ID to the irdaDeviceID and sends the QUERY_CAPABILITIES command, using an IRSockets send() command, to the specified device.

The receiving device compares the attributes of the received Functional Unit Description Record(s) with the Functional Unit descriptions registered there. This comparison is performed via an algorithm specified in the Salutation Architecture Specification. If there is a positive compare, the service’s Salutation Manager packages its response in a QUERY_RESPONSE Salutation Protocol response and sends this to the client device in an IRSockets send() command. This information is passed through the client’s Salutation Manager and is returned to the client.

Data Exchange

When the client has located the service it requires, it may exchange other data through the IRSockets send() and receive() commands. When the communication is complete, the client application calls the IRSockets closeSocket() command.

The service application may use an slmUnregisterCapabilities Salutation Manager call to make a function unavailable to other devices.

Extensions

In the preceding example, the Salutation Architecture has been used on IrDA through the use of WinSockets. Similar techniques can be demonstrated using other Sockets interface to other protocols.

Watch for an application note that discusses the Salutation Service Discovery Protocol on IrDA to be posted in the coming weeks on the Salutation web site www.salutation.org.

(�E/span> 1999 Bluetooth SIG. This article originally appeared on the Bluetooth website in the Bluetooth Newsletter SIGnal  (http://www.bluetooth.com/newsletter1.asp.) and has been reprinted here with permission from the Bluetooth SIG.

As computing continues to move to a network centric model, finding and making use of services that may be available in the network becomes increasingly important. Services can include common ones such as printing, paging and faxing, as well as various kinds of information access like teleconferencing, network bridges and access points and e-commerce facilities �Emost any kind of service that a server or service provider might offer.

In addition to the need for a standard way of discovering available services, there are other considerations. For instance, getting access to the services (finding and obtaining the protocols, access methods, "drivers" and other code necessary to utilize the service), controlling access to the services, advertising the services, choosing among competing services, billing for services, and so on. This problem is widely recognized; many companies, standards bodies and consortia are addressing it at various levels in various ways. Service Location Protocol (SLP) ₁, Jini^TM ₂, Universal Plug and Play^TM (UPnP^TM) ₃, and Salutation^TM ₄, to name just a few, all address some aspect of service discovery.

A Dedicated Protocol

The Bluetooth Service Discovery Protocol (SDP) addresses service discovery specifically for the Bluetooth environment. It is optimized for the highly dynamic nature of Bluetooth communications. SDP focuses primarily on discovering services available from or through Bluetooth-enabled devices. SDP does not define methods for accessing services; once services are discovered with SDP, they can be accessed in various ways, depending upon the service. This might include the use of other service discovery and access mechanisms such as those mentioned above.

SDP provides a means for other protocols to be used along with SDP in those environments where this can be beneficial. For example, using SDP, a client could discover a service offered by a Bluetooth-enabled device. One attribute of that service might specify that the service supports Salutation, and Salutation could then be used for further interaction with that service. (The Bluetooth SIG has published a white paper describing mapping between Salutation and SDP, see [5]; mappings to other protocols may be published in the future). Although SDP can coexist with other service discovery protocols, it does not require them. In Bluetooth environments, services can be discovered using SDP and can be accessed using other protocols defined by the Bluetooth SIG or by others.

Why Develop Another?

With so many available service discovery protocols to choose from, why has the Bluetooth SIG specified its own service discovery protocol? As noted above, the dynamic nature of Bluetooth communications calls for a simple and compact service discovery protocol. As a contributing adopter member of the Bluetooth SIG, Motorola® proposed a protocol based upon their Piano ^TM ₆ platform, a technology suited to wireless mobile applications such as found in Bluetooth environments. The SIG adopted this proposal and made many modifications and adaptations to produce the Bluetooth Service Discovery Protocol found in the Bluetooth Specification Release 1.0. With this specification release, the SIG provides service discovery that is well-suited to Bluetooth environments, is integrated into the Bluetooth software stack, and can coexist with many other service discovery protocols and technologies.

(The trademarks given in the above article are the property of their respective owners.)

References
1) IETF RFC 2165 http://www.ietf.org/rfc/rfc2165.txt

2) http://java.sun.com/jini

3) http://www.upnp.org

[4) http://www.salutation.org

5) Mapping Salutation Architecture APIs to Bluetooth Service Discovery Layer, http://www.bluetooth.com/document/download.asp?doc=172

6) http://www.mot.com/GSS/SSTG/piano/

Other resources Bluetooth Specification Release 1.0, Service Discovery Protocol, http://www. bluetooth.com

Bluetooth Profiles Release 1.0, Service Discovery Application Profile, http://www.bluetooth.com

Discovering Devices and Services in Home Networks, an IBM white paper, http://www-3.ibm.com/pvc/nethome/networking.shtml

Editor’s Note: As stated in the “News�Esection of this newsletter, the Consortium has been working with the Bluetooth Special Interest Group to assure consistency with service discovery protocols. The latest results of this cooperation are found in the white paper showing how Salutation can be used in the Bluetooth environment. The white paper may be downloaded from the Salutation website at http://www.salutation.org/whitepaper/BtoothMapping.PDF.

• October 25-27, 1999

• Demonstration of NuOffice and Salutation-Lite (Booth #14) 

• Seaport Hotel, Boston MA