User-centric situation awareness in ubiquitous computing environments

Abstract

The rising popularity of ubiquitous computing has resulted in a paradigm shift from generic to user-centric solutions, requiring seamless integration of heterogeneous devices and sensors in the environment to constantly monitor and perform tasks traditionally performed by the user. There is a considerable push, therefore, to develop systems capable of perceiving user behavior, and adapting to their idiosyncrasies. In this paper, we discuss limitations of the interpretations of context, and extend them for improved context awareness. We discuss a user-centric approach to perception of activity in the environment, and use the obtained knowledge in understanding user activities. We present a system for perceiving situations, and discuss an approach to empower the user to develop complex, yet intuitive, rules. We evaluate the performance of the system in a dynamic ubiquitous environment. © Institute for Computer Sciences, Social Informatics and Telecommunications Engineering 2012.