2.2 Architecture
The AREA architecture has been designed with the
goal to be able to easily exchange and extend its components.
The design comprises four main modules
organized in a multi-tier architecture and complying
with the Model View Controller pattern (cf. Fig. 3).
Lower tiers offer their services and functions by interfaces
to upper tiers. In particular, the red tier (cf. Fig.
3) will be described in detail in Section 3, when discussing
the differences regarding the development of
AREA on the iOS and Android platforms. Based on
this architectural design, modularity can be ensured;
i.e., both data management and various elements (e.g.,
the POIs) can be customized and extended on demand.
Furthermore, the compact design of AREA
enables us to build new mobile business applications
based on it as well as to easily integrate it with existing
applications.