On defining and modeling context-awareness

Abstract

Purpose

This paper aims to present a methodology for defining and modeling context-awareness and describing efficiently the interactions between systems, applications and their context. Also, the relation of modern context-aware systems with distributed computation is investigated.

Design/methodology/approach

On this purpose, definitions of context and context-awareness are developed based on the theory of computation and especially on a computational model for interactive computation which extends the classical Turing Machine model. The computational model proposed here encloses interaction and networking capabilities for computational machines.

Findings

The definition of context presented here develops a mathematical framework for working with context. Also, the modeling approach of distributed computing enables us to build robust, scalable and detailed models for systems and application with context-aware capabilities. Also, it enables us to map the procedures that support context-aware operations providing detailed descriptions about the interactions of applications with their context and other external sources.

Practical implications

A case study of a cloud-based context-aware application is examined using the modeling methodology described in the paper so as to demonstrate the practical usage of the theoretical framework that is presented.

Originality/value

The originality on the framework presented here relies on the connection of context-awareness with the theory of computation and distributed computing.

Citation

Rodis, P. (2018), "On defining and modeling context-awareness", International Journal of Pervasive Computing and Communications, Vol. 14 No. 2, pp. 111-123. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJPCC-D-18-00003