Solution

In order to solve the previous problems we propose a complete system that consists of: User web page, J2ME based mobile application and java based server. The user web page allows consumers to create their own health and preferences profile which contains: User Culture, Allergy Type, Diseases and Health case, Calories Based Diet, User preferences and dislikes. The system can store users’ health and preferences profile in a “User Preferences” database before going shopping.

J2ME based mobile application can be used while shopping to scan and recognize products EAN-13 barcodes, then send the barcode to java based server with the user ID. The java based server is responsible for comparing the product information with the user health and preferences profile after scanning the barcode, and returning the results. After these process consumers can find the answer if the product fits with their needs or not and know how percentage the product is suitable to them.

In addition, the user web page provides many services that can help consumers to know more about the products. It also presents information about the relation between the food and health, diseases, allergies, and cultures.

Below are the services that the user web page provides:

1. Allowing consumers to check the shopping history depending on the previous scanned barcodes which helps in remembering the amount of products bought this month and making decisions about next month shopping budgets.

2. Providing automatic functions such as Suggestion Products and New Items, which helps consumers by suggesting some items that fit with their health and preferences and inform them if there are new products in the market that are suitable to them.

3. By integrating "EZBuy: My Product Info" with a real markets and vendors the system allows consumers to suggest some new products, so vendors can know users needs and wishes from their shop.

4. Providing a service to enable consumers to write feed backs and read others comments.

5. Enabling consumers to contact by sharing their experience and bad; good stories about diet.

All of these services that the system provides will be explained in more details later.

The following graph shows the basic features of the system.

Figure 1: System outlines 

Figure 1 shows the key points of the suggested solution. And it contains the following:

1. Before Shopping: Create User Health and Preferences Profile.

2. While Shopping: Scan Products Barcodes and recognize it.

3. After Shopping: View History, Suggestion Products, New Items, Write/Read feedbacks, Sharing Diet Experience and User Order.

1.4.1 Why mobile phone and J2ME? 

Over the past decade, mobile communications technology has made giant development, moving rapidly from the first generation (1G) of analog voice-only communications, to the second-generation (2G) of digital voice and data communications. Now, a revolutionary third-generation (3G) mobile communications platform has arrived. Third generation mobile network is a wireless communication system for a range of radio technologies that are designed to enhance the capabilities for radio-based networks. 3G is designed to offer high-speed e-mail and Internet access. Besides that, 3G also allow transmission of large-scale data. The rapid development of mobile communication technologies and the rapidly growing number of mobile devices result in the fast growth of Mobile E-Commerce, M-Commerce [7] [8].

Traditional E-Commerce applications are typically developed over the Web for human-computer interaction. These applications require that users must login the intended Web sites from their PCs through Internet. Also, users often need to visit lots of websites to conduct electronic transactions, which is a time-consuming process. Traditional E-Commerce restricts more normal behaviors of users.

With the advancement in mobile technology, many business activities can be conducted through wireless networks, which extend the demands of client users for spatial location and realizes these enterprise demands. M-Commerce deals with selling goods, services, and contents that include related functions like advertising and payment transactions over wireless networks which are connected in real time and from any place. 3G is viewed as a necessary underlying infrastructure for the m-commerce.

Our system proposes the architecture of M-Commerce systems applied to 3G networks based on J2ME technology. In chapter 2, we will give a brief description of the related background technology such as M-Commerce, 3G and J2ME platform. Thereafter, chapter3 describes the architecture for our system and introduces the design and implementation of the system applied to 3G network platform using J2ME. Finally, it draws conclusions on the benefits of such system.

Below some features that mobile phones supported:

1. Send and receive data, access WAP services, and provide full Internet access using technologies such as GPRS.

2. Sending and receiving pictures and videos through MMS, and for short distances with e.g.

Bluetooth.

3. The ability to download new applications and services.

4. Large display screens.

1.4.2 Why barcode? 

A barcode is an optical machine-readable representation of data, which shows data about the object to which it attaches. Originally, barcodes represented data by varying the widths and spacing of parallel lines, and may be referred to as linear or 1 dimensional (1D). Later they evolved into rectangles, dots, hexagons and other geometric patterns in 2 dimensions (2D). Although 2D systems use a variety of symbols, they are generally referred to as barcodes as well. Barcodes originally were scanned by special–optical scanners called barcode readers, scanners and interpretive software are available on devices including desktop printers and smart phones [9] [10].

In similar words barcode is a method of representing data by combining series of vertical lines that contain product information. This includes nutritional information, ingredients, contents which may

cause allergy, and country of origin. This information can be extracted using an optical scanner barcode reader. The European Article Numbering (EAN)-13 barcode is used internationally for tagging retail goods [1].

Our system focuses on extracted theses information about the product not by using an optical scanner but by using mobile phone camera.

Next section describes previous works related to our system that helps us in introducing a complete system for various people with different needs.