Modeling and simulation to assist context aware system design

摘要

In this paper we present a modelling and visualization design approach for context-aware systems, specifically focusing on applications that support location tracking and that exhibit their behaviour as actuations in the deployment environment. The design tool addresses two key challenges in the design cycle for ubiquitous computing systems. Firstly, facilitating cost-effective, repeatable and easily (re-)configurable experiments that support thorough testing of the target deployment space, including outlier test scenarios. Secondly, supporting an iterative design cycle, using traceability of the causal relationships between context and exhibited system behaviour. The aim is to identify potentially problematic behaviour in the system under test, which can be provided as feedback to lead informed redesign of the prototype system. In this paper we present initial experiments using this tool to test a simple automatic lighting application. We discuss the results and the implications of the findings from these experiments for the models used to drive this design tool.