Patent ID: 7664080

Claim:
A wireless sensor network comprising: a plurality of nodes that communicate over wireless communication links, wherein at least one of the plurality of nodes receives sensor data from a sensor; wherein the wireless sensor network is queried by specifying in a query a set of events of interest; wherein for each event of interest included in the set of events of interest, a producer node included in the plurality of nodes identifies when that event of interest occurs and, when that event of interest occurs, transmits event data related to that event of interest to a consumer node included in the plurality of nodes in response to the occurrence of that event of interest; wherein the query is expressed in a discrete event process algebra that is used to manage processing performed to implement the query; and wherein the discrete event process algebra comprises an operator that defines first and second subsets of the set of events of interest, wherein the first and second subsets are prioritized, wherein the operator specifies that the first and second subsets by synchronized.