Project info

Contact

You can contact the WalT project team by using: walt-contact at univ-grenoble-alpes.fr

As a WalT user, or if you intend to use WalT, you can also subscribe to the list of walt users.

People

Project leaders

emails: <firstname>.<lastname> at imag.fr

Main contributors

  • Pierre Brunisholz, core WalT, testing, documentation & tutorials
  • Baptiste Jonglez, WalT images design, development
  • Henri-Joseph Audéoud, testing, demo setup, python3 transition
  • Narek Davtyan, development of virtual & vpn nodes
  • Ayoub Bargach, testing & documentation
  • Bastien Faure, core WalT
  • Pierre-Henry Frohring, core WalT
  • Jorge Luis Baranguan Castro, VizWalT visualization plugin for Cooja
  • Cosmin Nichifor, WalT synchronization
  • Jorane Congio-Hollard, development of version management modules

Additional support

  • Elodie Morin, testing and demo setup
  • Timothy Claeys, testing and demo setup
  • Onss Bousbih, testing and demo setup
  • Joao Guilherme Zeni, sensor integration & Contiki instrumentation
  • Matheus Castanho, sensor integration
  • Iacob Juc, sensor integration
  • Liviu Varga, sensor integration

History

WalT started as a attempt to fill the gap between small ad hoc experiments and large scale remote platforms like FIT IoT-lab.

A first prototype was developed as a FabLab project at Grenoble-INP Ensimag.

Development was then funded by Université Grenoble Alpes, Grenoble INP / UJF, throught AGIR 2013-2014 WalT project.

The following projects are also tightly linked to the WalT platform (co-funding, experiments on WalT):

  • ANR IRIS - Reseaux Tout IP pour le Futur Internet d'Objets Intelligents (2011)
  • FP7 ICT CALIPSO - Connect All IP-based Smart Objects (2011)
  • ANR DataTweet - un service public de communications opportunistes (2013)
  • Persyval SPREAD - Plateforme pédagogique pour l'expérimentation sur des systèmes massivement distribués (2015)

Design goals

A WalT platform can be qualified with the following adjectives.

Versatile

You can 'plug' any OS image on WalT nodes. And WalT provides what you need to create such an image, or adapt an existing one. Someone will use an IoT-oriented image to drive sensor boards connected on USB. Others will add a java virtual machine on the image and run distributed data management scenarios. The other factor for versatility is that you can completely adapt the platform shape to your needs. Usually, one will use small size deployments for debugging or mobile demos, and a large size one for final experiments.

Lightweight

WalT is based on RaspberryPi SBCs, PoE switches, and a standard PC for the server. There is no specific hardware.

Cost-effective

A WalT platform costs less than 100$ per node.

Easy to use

The demos should prove this point.

Easy to install

We provide a USB image to install the server, a minimal SD-card image for raspberry pi nodes, a USB image to turn a PC into a walt node, and complete installation procedures.

Collaborative

OS images of WalT nodes can be shared on the docker hub. This is the case for default images. This helps to collaborate with other users.

The development of WalT is open source. Anyone interested is welcome to contribute!