Context Aware Messaging and Addressing for Emergency Applications

Alaa Almagrabi, Seng Loke, Torab Torabi Department of Computer Science and Computer Engineering La Trobe University

Outline
Research aim and Objectives Background Related work Discussion Proposal Spatial modeling for emergency systems System ontology Conclusion

Research Aims
We aim to investigate context-aware messaging and addressing for emergency situations . Assist-Me is an emergency alert that will be activate to help avoiding disaster. Outdoor emergency systems refer to the measures that we put in place in order to help us effectively deal with disasters within the society Investigating context models is required for designing efficient and expressive messaging and addressing services.

Objectives of literature survey

Investigate the concept of context aware messaging and addressing. Presents an overview some common applications that use contextaware messaging. The context aware messaging applications that are used for emergency purposes. smart bushfire monitoring and detection system using GSM technology A bushfire monitoring and detection system for smart homes using ZigBee technology The context-aware messaging applications that used for guides and reminders. ComMotion, Cybre-Minder, Elvinetc The context aware messaging applications for social purposes which includes: communication and interaction between people. Context-Mediated Social Awareness, Live Contacts, MicroBlog, InfoRadaretc

Background
Context awareness is more than twenty years old (Coppola, et. al., 2005). Context-awareness is a key aspect of new applications in the field of ubiquitous computing. Mobile and ubiquitous computing environments can now match and even replace traditional desktop computing. Chen and Kotz 2000, discuss the relation between contextaware computing and mobile computing model in which applications can determine and take advantage of contextual information. Contextual information can be used as an alternative to old fashion addressing techniques such IP addresses for communication purposes (Geiger, et. al., 2009).

What is Context?
Schilit et. al., (1994) divides context into three categories: i. Computing context. ii. User context. iii. Physical context. Chen and Kotz (2000) continued that work and introduced fourth category of context called time. Dey et. al., 1999 define context as any information that can be used to distinguish the situation of an entity, where entity can be a person, place, or object that is considered relevant to the interaction between the user and application. Schmidt et al., (2002) defines context as knowledge about the users and IT devices state, including surroundings, situation, and to a less extent, location.

Context Aim
The basic aim of context awareness is to provide computers with situational information in order to execute tasks. Context awareness aim can be found as the use of any information related to the users situation and surrounding in order for the application to progress and execute a task (Deys, 2001). Haseloff (2005) defines the aim of context awareness as providing computers with situational or contextual information as a result of which they accordingly adapt the execution of tasks and the way of interacting with users.

Related work: Applications use Context-Aware Messaging

Figure. A classification of context-aware messaging application

Application A smart bushfire Monitoring and detection system (Rong et al. 2010).

type emergency application

Technology GSM telephones and GPS receiver. Sensor, microcontroller and power supply

Architecture hybrid

Usage SMS format

Context model sensors for location, temperature and humidity

A bushfire monitoring and detection system for smart homes (Sun et al. 2010).

emergency application

ZigBee modules: GSM modem and GPS receiver. Sensor, microcontroller and power supply

hybrid

SMS format

sensors for location, temperature, humidity, wind speed and direction

Context-aware messaging in Emergency Applications

Application

type

Technology

Architecture centralized

Usage present graphical and textual interface to allow messaging text, audio, video and multimedia

Context model location using sensor and GPS and time

ComMotion notification GPS, Web-Server, (Marmasse and and guidance CDPD and Data Schmandt, 2000). Mapping

Cybre-Minder (Anind and Gregory 2000).

notification Context-Toolkit, CRB, and guidance Sensors

centralized

Elvin (Loke and Zaslavsky 2003)

notification Mobile agent, Server, and guidance ACL communicative

centralized

The PIL museum notification IR and Wi-Fi Visitors Guide and guidance System (Kuflik et al. 2007)

centralized

text can be integers, floating point, Strings etc messaging, guide book, conversation and presentation

contextual information; location using sensor and GPS, time and nearby people etc location using GPS , time and event (message content)

location using IR and Wi-Fi, time and contextual states

Context Aware Applications for Reminder, Guidance and Notification

Application

type

Technology

Architecture

Usage

Context model

Socialight (Melinger et al. 2004)

Social network: uses different social Communication networks, GPS and and collaboration Bluetooth beacons

client server

message can be text, audio, video, and multimedia associated with geographical map mobile messaging technique to send or view the message

location of friend within the network

Context aware group communication system (Jou and Wang, 2006)

Social network: Communication and Collaboration

the client uses HP iPAQ hx2410 Pocket PCs and the server side is Fedora Core 2 Linux-Wireless network

client server

location of mobile user to present basic group communication

Context-Aware Messaging in Social Network Applications with Single-Context

Application Micro-Blog (Gaonkar et al. 2008)

type Social network: Communicatio n and collaboration

Technology

Architecture

Usage sharing, browsing, and querying global information in SMS format and Photos

Context model location and time of the device

J2ME and Nokia N95 for hybrid client side, the server is built using MySQL, Wireless And Google Maps or Microsoft Sensor Map

InfoRadar (Rantanen et al. 2004)

Social network: Communicatio n and Collaboration

PDA, GPS and radar metaphor

centralized

text message: SMS format and multimedia elements

location of mobile phone and time which represent lifespan

Context-Aware Messaging in Social Network Applications with Double-Context

Application Context mediated social awareness (Bardram and Hansen, 2004)

type Social network: Communication and collaboration

Technology PDA for the client and GPRS to communicate with server

Architecture hybrid

Usage messaging: text, audio, video, multimedia

Context model the messaging time, the users location, personal status, and activity

Context aware communication with Live Contacts (Hofte et al. 2004)

Social Network: Communication and collaboration

the clients implemented in C# , the server is Microsoft.NET and uses GPRS to connect with GSM

hybrid

Messaging technique (text, voice, video, multimedia)

location, time from the user, instant messaging status, current and near future calendar appointments, and color coded availability

Context-Aware Messaging in Social Network Applications with Multi-Context

Application

type

Technology

Architecture

Usage

Context model

Using semantic web technology for ubiquitous location modeling(Stahl and Heckmann, 2004)
Framework for mobile context based messaging applications(Antti and Timo, 2007)

Social network: Mobile, IR- GPS, Communication sensors, and Collaboration Semantic OWL, Yamamoto and URIs

hybrid

provide text information, presentation of audio and visual media output

location, User characteristics, any situational context (event, objects) and Map

Social network: Communication and collaboration

J2ME, XML, JSR- centralized 179 Location API and GPS locator device.

Text message: SMS format and Multimedia elements

location, time and Application services

Context-Aware Messaging in Social Network Applications with Multi-Context

In summary, the number of types of context being used in the application varies with time to time and with application to application. In recently year we notice that the use of the number of different types of context in applications increased significantly as compare to the previous years.

Proposal for Assist-Me System

Emergency systems refer to the measures that we put in place in order to help us effectively deal with disasters within the society Modern technology such as remote sensing with the use of wireless devices increases the chances of detecting slight changes in the environment. The use modern technology in disaster management simplifies decision making saving time and providing help where necessary .

Spatial relations (Enclosing Space)

Spatial data models where the use of geographic information system (GIS) in providing information concerning current events is increasingly attracting global interest in a number of fields. spatial can be anything that are related to a certain area or space not necessary physically geographic such as the human activities as going to the farm. Spatial awareness allows the system to autonomously resolve and use its spatial properties to relate these properties to the spatial properties of other systems

Typical Disaster Scenario

Flooding Scenario

The Spatial Relation between Clients

Figure8. The Server Grouping the Clients

The Spatial Relation between Clients and Danger Zones

FIRE Client in Red Zone Client in Yellow Zone Client in Blue Zone

300m Blue Zone

100m Red 200m Zone Yellow Zone

Figure $. The Relation between the Clients and the Danger Zones.

The Spatial Relation between Clients and Rescuers

Client Rescuer Figure . The Relation between Clients and Rescuer

The Spatial Relation between Clients and Main Points of Interest

Figure . The Relation between Clients and Main Points of Interest

System Ontology
Emergency_Situation has_stage 1 * Stage Region 1 1

1 involves

Danger_zone
1

*
1

1 1 *

White_zone

* Actors *

* has_location 1

Point_of_interest

Figure . The System General Ontology

Future work
Developing the ontology.
Evaluating the ontology. Implementation & performance measurements.

Thank you