Pablo A. Haya

A Prototype of a Context-Based Architecture for Intelligent Home Environments

This paper presents a proposal of a context-based architecture to achieve the required synergy among the ubiquitous computing devices of an intelligent environment. These devices produce context information that models the behaviour of the environment. This context information is the glue among the devices and the context-aware applications. The generated context information provides a common view of the world. A blackboard architecture allows to share this context information and a context model is proposed to represent it. A prototype of such a smart room has been developed, including several devices as well as a set of context-aware demonstrators. They work together employing the context information stored on the blackboard.

Easing the smart home: Semi-automatic adaptation in perceptive environments

This work has been partially funded by the Spanish Ministry of Science and Education, (project TIN2004-03140) and by U.A.M-Grupo Santander (project Itech Calli), and is part of the UAM-SOLUZIONA AmI Laboratory research program. Special thanks to Eran Eden and Manuel Freire for their recommendations.

A Mechanism for Solving Conflicts in Ambient Intelligent Environments

Ambient Intelligence scenarios describe situations in which multitude of devices and agents live together. In this kind of scenarios is frequent to see the appearance of conflicts when modifying the state of a device as for example a lamp. Those problems are not as much of sharing of resources as of conflict of orders coming from different agents. This coexistence must deal also with the desire of privacy of the different users over their personal information such as where they are, what their preferences are or to whom this information should be available. When facing incompatible orders over the state of a device it turns necessary to make a decision. In this paper we propose a centralised mechanism based on prioritized FIFO queues to decide the order in which the control of a device is granted. The priority of the commands is calculated following a policy that considers issues such as the commanders role, commands type, contexts state and commander-context and commander-resource relations. Finally we propose a set of particular policies for those resources that do not adjust to the general policy. In addition we present a model pretending to integrate privacy through limiting and protecting contextual information.

Do not disturb: physical interfaces for parallel peripheral interactions

Interaction is, intrinsically, a multi-thread process. Supported by our various senses, our ability to speak, and the structure of our body and mind we can get simultaneously involved in multiple interactions, using different resources for each of them. This paper analyses natural interactions and the impact of using parallel channels in peripheral interactions. Applying a similar approach to human-computer interaction, we present a Tangible User Interface proof of concept to analyze the advantages and weakness of parallel interaction in computer-based systems. To this end, two tangible applications -to control the profile status in social networks and to control an Intelligent Room- are compared to their usual graphical counterparts, presenting the results of a user study and analyzing the implications of its results.

A Plug and Play Spoken Dialogue Interface for Smart Environments

In this paper we present a plug and play dialogue system for smart environments. The environment description and its state are stored on a domain ontology. This ontology is formed by entities that represent real world contextual information and abstract concepts. This information is complemented with linguistic parts that allow to automatically create a spoken interface for the environment. The spoken interface is based on multiple dialogues, related to every ontology entity with linguistic information. Firstly, the dialogue system creates appropriate grammars for the dialogues. Secondly, it creates the dialogue parts, employing a tree structure. Grammars support the recognition process and the dialogue tree supports the interpretation and generation processes. The system is being tested with a prototype formed by a living room. Users may interact with and modify the physical state of this living room environment by means of the spoken dialogue interface.

Adaptive manuals as assistive technology to support and train people with acquired brain injury in their daily life activities

Assistive technologies and ubiquitous computing can be related since both try to help people in their lives. This common objective motivated us to develop and evaluate a system that puts ubiquitous computing technologies into the rehabilitation process of people with acquired brain injury. Thus, in this paper, we present and evaluate a system that shows adaptive manuals for daily-life activities for people with acquired brain injury. This first evaluation allowed us to validate our approach and also to extract valuable information about these systems as well as environmental factors that may affect the patients.

User Modeling and Adaptation for Daily Routines

The goal of this chapter is to bring light about how adaptation technologies can ease daily living for people with special needs. Assistive technologies, adaptive systems and context-aware applications are three wellestablished research areas whose findings can be interestingly merged. In particular, adaptation methods and techniques support the adaptation of existing software to better suit each user’s need. In the last years, the need of building applications that allow the inclusion of people with special needs in different fields has been emphasized. Along this chapter, we present different research works that contribute to the integration of this collective, by providing means to support either their personal development or the accomplishment of their daily tasks. The technological solutions chosen for this chapter are mainly related to three areas of application: activities of daily living, health and education. This chapter also summarizes the most widely used adaptation features and processes in this context. E. Martı́n ( ) Departamento de Lenguajes y Sistemas Informáticos I, Escuela Técnica Superior en Ingenierı́a Informática, Universidad Rey Juan Carlos, c/Tulipán s/n, 28933 Móstoles, Madrid, Spain e-mail: estefania.martin@urjc.es P.A. Haya Instituto de Ingenierı́a de Conocimiento, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Av. Francisco Tomas y Valiente, 11, 28049 Madrid, Spain e-mail: pablo.haya@iic.uam.es R.M. Carro Departamento de Ingenierı́a Informática, Escuela Politécnica Superior, Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Av. Francisco Tomas y Valiente, 11, 28049 Madrid, Spain e-mail: rosa.carro@uam.es E. Martı́n et al. (eds.), User Modeling and Adaptation for Daily Routines: Providing Assistance to People with Special Needs, Human–Computer Interaction Series, DOI 10.1007/978-1-4471-4778-7 1,

Context Adaptive Interaction with an Automatically Created Spoken Interface for Intelligent Environments

In this paper we present the interpretation and generation processes of a spoken dialogue interface for intelligent environments. The interface is automatically created for each specific environment and the interpretation and generation vary depending on the environment and its context. These processes rely on a dialogue tree structure. Several modules process the tree structure and the environment context information to produce specific dialogues for the current environment state. Dialogues are provided with clarification, error recovering, anaphora resolution and other capabilities. The interface is implemented in a real intelligent environment laboratory.

Where should I go?: guiding users with cognitive limitations through mobile devices outdoors

During our life, we are involved in different routines and decision- making tasks that we repeat daily in diverse contexts. While some people can cope with this easily, it may be harder for others. For example, travelling from one place to another can constitute a major problem for people with cognitive disabilities, which may represents a great barrier for their integration, in both social and working environments. We have developed a tool to assist users with cognitive limitations to way-finding. Guidance is provided by means of mobile devices through different media (audio, images, etc.). In this paper we present the results of the interaction of a group of users with cognitive disabilities with this tool. We show the usefulness of this type of guidance for this kind of users, as well as the interface that better suited their personal needs.

Easing the Smart Home: A rule-based language and multi-agent structure for end user development in Intelligent Environments

The present paper summarizes the Phd Dissertation of Manuel Garcia-Herranz [1] including the oral defenses.