Book excerpt: Although the Internet of Things (IoT) is a vast and dynamic territory that is evolving rapidly, there has been a need for a book that offers a holistic view of the technologies and applications of the entire IoT spectrum. Filling this void, The Internet of Things in the Cloud: A Middleware Perspective provides a comprehensive introduction to the IoT and its development worldwide. It gives you a panoramic view of the IoT landscape—focusing on the overall technological architecture and design of a tentatively unified IoT framework underpinned by Cloud computing from a middleware perspective. Organized into three sections, it: Describes the many facets of Internet of Things—including the four pillars of IoT and the three layer value chain of IoT Focuses on middleware, the glue and building blocks of a holistic IoT system on every layer of the architecture Explores Cloud computing and IoT as well as their synergy based on the common background of distributed processing The book is based on the author’s two previous bestselling books (in Chinese) on IoT and Cloud computing and more than two decades of hands-on software/middleware programming and architecting experience at organizations such as the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, IBM, BEA Systems, and Silicon Valley startup Doubletwist. Tapping into this wealth of knowledge, the book categorizes the many facets of the IoT and proposes a number of paradigms and classifications about Internet of Things' mass and niche markets and technologies.