Context-Aware Middleware Support for Component Based Applications in Pervasive Computing

Abstract

Ubiquitous computing allows application developers to build a large and complex distributed system that can transform physical spaces into computationally active and intelligent environments. Ubiquitous applications need a middleware that can detect and act upon any context changes created by the result of any interactions between users, applications, and surrounding computing environment for applications without users’ interventions. The context-awareness has become the one of core technologies for application services in ubiquitous computing environment and been considered as the indispensable function for ubiquitous computing applications. The need for high quality context management is evident to the component-based middleware for it forms the basis of the component adaptation and the component deployment in the pervasive computing. Therefore, we suggest a holistic approach where context management is an integral part of a more comprehensive adaptation enabling middleware, thus enabling the development and support of context-aware, component-based applications.

This work was funded by the National Grand Fundamental Research 973 Program of China under Grant No.2005cb321804, the National High-Tech Research and Development Plan of China under Grant No.2004AA112020.