ABSTRACT
This chapter discusses the challenge of searching in sensor networks by presenting the general concepts of Web search along with the drawbacks when adopted for sensor networks as well as new approaches to overcome the resource limitations of small embedded devices. It presents architecture for a semantic sensor search engine as a first step toward a next-generation search engine. Sensor networks are characterized by limited resources in terms of processing power, bandwidth, memory, and energy capacity. However, they are commonly connected to the Internet via powerful gateways/proxy servers. To retrieve up-to-date readings from sensors, a pull-based approach is often used in sensor networks. Whenever readings from a sensor are needed, they are actively requested by the gateway or another computer on the Internet. Distributed Image Search exploits camera sensors to take pictures of the environment. A user can query the system by submitting an image to it.
