The Context Modelling Toolkit: A Unified Multi-Layered Context Modelling Approach

Presentation given at EICS 2017, 9th ACM SIGCHI Symposium on Engineering Interactive Computing Systems, Lisbon, Portugal.

ABSTRACT: Context awareness plays an important role in recent smart environments and embedded interactions. In order to increase user satisfaction and acceptance, these context-aware solutions should be controllable by end users. Over the last few years we have therefore seen an emerging trend towards visual programming tools for context-aware applications based on simple "IF this THEN that" rules. However, existing solutions often do not support the simple reuse of the "this" part in order to define more sophisticated rules. Given that the desired level of control varies among individuals, we propose a unified multi-layered context modelling approach distinguishing between end users, expert users and programmers. Our Context Modelling Toolkit (CMT) consists of the necessary context modelling concepts and offers a rule-based context processing engine. We further illustrate how end users and expert users might interact with the CMT framework. Finally, we highlight some advantages of our Context Modelling Toolkit by discussing a number of use cases.

Research paper: https://beatsigner.com/publications/the-context-modelling-toolkit-a-unified-multi-layered-context-modelling-approach.pdf

Transcript

1. Sandra Trullemans
   Lars Van Holsbeeke
   Beat Signer
   The Context Modelling Toolkit:
   A Unified Multi-layered Context
   Modelling Approach
   Sandra.Trullemans@vub.be
   WEB & INFORMATION
   SYSTEMS ENGINEERING
   

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2. End User Control of Smart Homes
   End User
   

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3. Related Work
   Jigsaw – Humble et al.
   ICAP – Dey et al.
   Ghiani et al.
   

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4. IF situation THEN action
   IF THEN
   I Sleep
   IF THEN
   Message in meeting
   Situation
   Situation
   

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5. Where We Can do Better
   • Sensor-level knowledge required
   • Hard for complex situations
   • Trade-off between control and automation
   Collaboration
   Reusing Situations
   

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6. Multi-layered Modelling Approach
   End User Expert User Programmer
   

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7. Context Modelling
   +
   Reusing Situations Templates
   

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8. Reusing Situations
   IF THEN
   I Sleep
   IF THEN
   I Sleep
   Situation
   Situation
   

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9. Situation Rules
   IF THEN
   I Sleep
   IF THEN
   Situation
   Situation
   I Sleep
   

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10. Context Modelling
    +
    Reusing Situations Templates
    

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11. Templates
    IF THEN
    Someone is Sleeping
    A Time A Bed A Room A State
    Situation
    Expert User
    

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12. Filling In a Template
    IF THEN
    Someone is Sleeping
    A Time A Bed A Room A State
    20:00 Her Bed Her Bedroom OFF
    End User
    

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13. Multi-Layered Context Modelling
    Facts Actions
    Situations
    Rules
    Tool Rule
    Templates
    Filled in
    Template
    Situations
    End User
    Expert User
    Programmer
    

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14. Context Modelling Toolkit - CMT
    Programmer
    

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15. Client-Server Interactions
    

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16. Creation of a Template
    Expert User
    

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17. The IF side of a Situation Rule
    Expert User
    

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18. A New Situation on the THEN side
    Expert User
    

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19. Filling In a Template
    End User
    

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20. Filling In a Template
    End User
    

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21. Reusing Templates
    End User
    

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22. Making Context Rules
    End User
    

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23. Lessons Learned
    • Importance of intelligibility
    

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24. Context Modelling Toolkit (CMT)
    End User Expert User Programmer
    Collaboration
    Reusing Situations
    

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25. References
    • Sandra Trullemans, Lars Van Holsbeeke and Beat
    Signer, The Context Modelling Toolkit: A Unified
    Multi-Layered Context Modelling Approach,
    Proceedings of the ACM on Human-Computer
    Interaction (PACMHCI), 1(1), June 2017, presented at
    EICS 2017, 9th ACM SIGCHI Symposium on
    Engineering Interactive Computing Systems, Lisbon,
    Portugal, June 2017
    – http://beatsigner.com/publications/trullemans_EICS2017.pdf
    

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