Allow · Adaptable Pervasive Flows

The objective of the project is to develop a new programming paradigm for human-oriented pervasive applications. This paradigm will enable pervasive technical systems to adapt automatically and seamlessly to humans involved and embedded in them, explicitly supporting people in achieving well-defined goals in dynamically changing environments and contexts. Furthermore, it will enable the integration of humans into pervasive business and working processes in an unobtrusive way. One of the major goals of the project is to design this technology such that the resulting environments are secure and trustworthy.<br/><br/>The key concept that will be developed within the project in order to realize these objectives is called Adaptable Pervasive Flow (APF). Many processes in real life are defined in terms of flows either implicitly of explicitly. A flow consists of a set of actions that is glued together by an execution plan in order to achieve a goal under a set of constraints. This resembles the well-known workflow concept. However, APFs represent a much broader concept that enables adaptable pervasive applications. They are situated in the real world, i.e. they are attached to entities like artifacts or people, moving with them through different contexts. While being carried along, they model the behavior intended for their entity and adapt the entity's environment to this behavior. Thus, when a mobile user carries a flow that specifies his prospective actions, the pervasive computing environment will be set up for him by the flow. The flow itself may also adapt to reflect changes. In order to achieve this, flows are context-aware. They can sense the context pertaining to their entity's current environment as well as the entity's actual activities.<br/><br/>In the proposed project, new mechanisms, methods, and principles for adaptable flow-based pervasive applications will be investigated, and a respective programming paradigm will be developed.