Heterogeneous services and architectures for next-generation wireless networks

Even though it is named as the successor of the previous cellular generations, the fourth generation of wireless mobile communication systems (4G) is predominantly presented as a convergence platform that provides clear advantages in terms of coverage, bandwidth, energy consumption and a variety of heterogeneous services, ranging from pop-up advertisements to location-based and interactive or on-demand ones (so called IP datacasting). Based on the above vision of 4G, in this paper we propose innovative services and architectures that may achieve enhanced security, energy efficiency, and just-for-you and just-in-time content delivery. Furthermore, since the state-of-the-art technologies do not appropriately cover the needs required for 4G, a context sensitive service discovery that can operate in a wireless as well as in a wired network environment, ranging from local to global distances, is described and applied to the case of the proposed services.