Cloud-edge-client continuum: leveraging browsers as deployment nodes with virtual pods

Nowadays, thanks to the ever-increasing hardware capacity of Edge computing, the achievement of Ubiquitous Computing is no longer a utopia, even though it presents still several challenges. In this paper, we introduce the concept of the Cloud-Edge-Client Continuum, by extending the well-known Cloud-Edge Continuum paradigm with the addition of Clients as deployment nodes. Specifically, we propose both a system architecture and a piece of middleware that allows a web browser to be used seamlessly as a deployment Client node, introducing the concept of a Virtual Point of Deployment (VPod). Our solution allows to: a) leverage the computational capacity of a huge number of ready-to-use devices that do not require the installation of any dependencies; b) optimize the use of resources with clear benefits for end users, who can take advantage of their computing capacity to process sensitive data; c) reduce infrastructure costs. In addition, our proposal opens toward a multitude of scenarios, as the logical division that exists in the common client-server architecture is overcome, enabling the creation of a Cloud-Edge-Client Continuum environment.