1. www.monash.edu.au CSE5610 Intelligent Software Systems Semester 1 Enabling Intelligent Systems in Pervasive Computing

2. www.monash.edu.au 2 Lecture Outline Pervasive Computing – Recap Strategy 1: Context-Awareness –Application adaptation in Pervasive/Ubiquitous Environments –What is context –Types of context –What is context-aware computing –Context-Aware Life Cycle –Why is context important?

3. www.monash.edu.au 3 Lecture Outline Strategy 2: Software Agents and Agent Mobility –What is a Software Agent –What is a Mobile Software Agent –Mobile Agent Apps in Pervasive Computing –Mobile Agent Toolkits for Small Devices –Why Agents in Pervasive Computing ?

4. www.monash.edu.au 4 Pervasive Computing - Recap Pervasive Computing = Mobile Computing + Ubiquitous Computing

5. www.monash.edu.au 5 Application Adaptation Ubiquitous and Mobile applications –Users have increased freedom of mobility –Environmental conditions vary more dynamically and frequently –User expectations of “anytime, anywhere” access to information and services –are subject to frequent changes Mobile and Ubiquitous applications need to adapt to changes to support better human-computer interaction Require information relating to changes in environments and ways of dealing with that information

6. www.monash.edu.au 6 What is Context? Human Interaction –Richness of language –Common understanding of how the world works –Implicit understanding of the way things work –Leads to implicit situational information or context Computers are unable to take full advantage of the context of human dialogue Improved access to context => Improved HCI => More useful computational services Enable app. designers to determine the context-aware behaviours that their apps. support.

7. www.monash.edu.au 7 What is Context? Human Interaction –Richness of language –Common understanding of how the world works –Implicit understanding of the way things work –Leads to implicit situational information or context Computers are unable to take full advantage of the context of human dialogue Improved access to context => Improved HCI => More useful computational services

8. www.monash.edu.au 8 Definitions of Context Shilt and Theimer: –Context is location, identities of nearby people and objects and changes to these objects Brown et. al –Context is location, identities of people around the user, the time of the day, season, temperature etc. Ryan et. al –Context is user’s location, identity, environment and time Dey –Context is the user’s emotional state, focus of attention, location and orientation, date and time, objects and people in the user’s environment Anind and Dey –Context is any information that can be used to characterise the situation of an entity. An entity is a person, place or object that is considered relevant to the interaction between a user and an application including the user and the applications themselves

9. www.monash.edu.au 9 Definitions of Context Where you are, who you are with and what resources are nearby Constantly changing execution environment –Computing environment –User Environment –Physical Environment

10. www.monash.edu.au 10 Categories of Context In practice, some contexts are more important than others from a computational perspective: –Location –Identity –Activity –Time Answer the questions of who, what, when and where Primary Context Types Form the basis for determining other contextual information known as Secondary Context Types

11. www.monash.edu.au 11 What is Context-Aware Computing Schilt and Theimer –Software that adapts according to its location of use, the collection of nearby people and objects, as well as changes to those objects over time First Context-aware research –Active Badge system at Cambridge AT&T Labs (Known as Olivetti at that time) Other Synonyms –Adaptive, Reactive, Responsive, Situated, Context- Sensitive and Environment-Directed Anind & Dey –A System is context-aware if it uses context to provide relevant information and/or services to the user, where relevance depends on the user’s task

12. www.monash.edu.au 12 What is Context-Aware Computing Context-Aware applications look at the who, where, what and when of entities to determine why a situation is occurring An application doesn’t determine the why, the application designer does

13. www.monash.edu.au 13 Types of Context-Aware Features Presentation of information and services to a user Automatic execution of a service Tagging of context to information for later retrieval –Associate digital data with a context that can be viewed within that context –E-notes

14. www.monash.edu.au 14 Context-Aware Life Cycle Context Discovery –Context Capture or Sensing –Sensors –Equipment –Users –Applications: Active Badges, CyberGuide, CyberDesk Context Selection or Interpretation –Mechanisms for notification of contextual updates, context storage etc. –Applications: Context Toolkit (Georgia Tech.), Context Information Service, Technology for Enabling Awareness (TEA), Audio Aura Context Use –Applications: Stick E-Notes, CoolTown, Active Maps, Most Ambient Intelligence Applications

15. www.monash.edu.au 15 Importance in Mobile and Ubiquitous Applications Dynamic user context Much to gain by effective use of context Customise application behaviour to user needs

16. www.monash.edu.au 16 Research Issues Semantics of Context Models Modeling Context Context Representation Languages Reasoning about context Etc.

17. www.monash.edu.au 17 References Towards a Better Understanding of Context and Context- Awareness by Anind Dey and Gregory Abowd A Survey of Context-Awareness by Keith Mitchell