Objects in Space

The paper presents a research agenda that we are currently executing for programming mobile applications that write and read information to and from passive RFID tags. Modern tags can host up to several kilobytes of information which makes it possible to store real software objects (in the object-oriented sense) that can even refer to each other. This gives the term ‘spatial database’ an entirely new meaning. The paper motivates the need for new programming language constructs that are specifically targeted towards representing objects on tags, designating specific tags in the application’s proximity and keeping the internal status of the mobile application causally connected to its physical surrounding.