Design and application of a middleware for context-aware ubiquitous computing

Abstract

In ubiquitous computing systems it is important for applications to obtain context information and adapt their behavior according to context information. For a ubiquitous application to obtain and use context information, it is necessary to provide basic services to discover proper context providers and exchange/store/infer from context information. Moreover, when providing such services, non-functional issues such as scalability, security, heterogeneity, etc. should also be considered. In this paper we describe the design and application of a middleware providing basic services. This middleware makes it easier for ubiquitous applications to obtain context information and for sensor networks to provide context information. We explain how the proposed middleware addresses the non-functional issues, too. Then we explain how the middleware can be applied to context aware authorization.