A formal model for mobile map adaptation

Abstract

Computing has become increasingly mobile and pervasive, which implies that services must be aware of and adapt to changing contexts in highly dynamic environments. Services that require a lot of user interaction have less potential of being used, because they tend to be obstructive. Thus, context-awareness and adaptation are important research issues in the area of mobile computing. A major goal is to minimize user interaction through service adaptation, and to provide context-sensitive and personalized information to the user. Adaptations for mobile map applications must consider a wide range of factors – from technical requirements to cognitive abilities and goals of the user. However, specifying contextual facts in an accurate and traceable manner is challenging. Initial approaches have focused on information visualization for mobile map applications through context information. These typically focus on simplifying and generalizing route segments rather than adapting to personal information. In this paper we propose a formal conceptual model for automatic mobile map adaptation that can be employed for different applications, such as pedestrian navigation. This model is composed of three components – a context model, a user model, and a task model. Through specified adaptation operations it aims at a reduction of both the user interaction with the service and the cognitive load for the user.