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In order for a software system to better serve the user, it should be able to adjust its behavior according to the changing needs in the environment. Oftentimes, selecting a particular action may depend upon various non‐functional requirements (NFRs) such as safety, cost, and so on. In the past, the many possible alternatives for an adaptation action by and large have not been considered systematically and rationally, keeping various NFRs in mind, hence, resulting in low‐level of confidence that such an action is indeed a best possible one that is really desirable. The purpose of this paper is to present a goal‐oriented approach to select alternative(s) based on a particular contextual event, while considering important NFRs.

The paper proposes a goal‐oriented approach in which various NFRs are treated as softgoals to be satisficed and used in exploring, analyzing and selecting among possible adaptation alternatives, in consideration of the particular contextual event.

Without the goal‐oriented methodology, which offers an ontology enriched with the notion of goals for contextual information and also integrates rules for triggering adaptation, the authors feel, through their scenario study applied to their smart‐phone application, that some critical issues might not have been considered in building a usable, useful system.

The concepts introduced in this paper provide a systematic and rational approach to select adaptation alternative(s), considering NFRs along with detecting a contextual event.