Introduction

The convergence of computing and communication technologies and solutions is all set to usher a big revolution in every facet of human lives. A fundamental measure of progress in computing technology involves rendering it as an inseparable part of our everyday experience while simultaneously making it disappear.

In the last four decades of IT adoption and usage, there came quite a number of technical innovations such as radical improvements in microprocessors performance and their cost and sharp reduction in computing devices’ sizes apart from revolutions in networking and communication (both wired as well as wireless) technologies along with improved battery technology. These much expected changes have brought the necessary transformations from the early large “computing machines” into compact, exciting and smart systems, devices and appliances that enable, initiate, alert, mediate, support, automate, manage and organize our daily activities. In this direction, Ubiquitous computing technologies promise the next logical step.

In this article, we describe what is all about UC, the technological challenges (software, hardware and applications) ahead for realizing this vision of invisible, location and context-aware computing environments to make UC a realistic one. We start with a brief of existing computing technologies and how they can combine together to achieve the next generation computing model.

Mobile computing

Mobile computing is fundamentally increasing our capability to physically move computing devices with us. Thus, the computer becomes a taken-for-granted, ever-present device that expands our capabilities to inscribe, store, communicate and reason independently of the device’s location. This can happen either by reducing the size of the computing devices or providing access to computing capacity over a broadband network through lightweight devices. This evolution has been marked by the movement of computers from insulated and sealed rooms to our offices, to our laps, and finally to our pockets, clothing, and body. Combined with access capability, this has transformed computing into an inspiring and exciting activity that can be carried out at a beach, a mall, a hotel, and an airport or even in a jungle.

Limitations of Mobile Computing

In mobile computing, however, an important limitation is that the computing model does not considerably change or adapt, while we move in the new context. This is because the computing device cannot seamlessly and flexibly obtain information about the context, in which the computing takes place and adjust it accordingly. The only way to accommodate the needs and possibilities of changing environments is to have, users manually control and configure the applications while they move, i.e. a task most users do not want to perform.

Pervasive computing

This novel computing model seems to be quietly catching up the computing arena. This implies that computer has the capability to obtain the information from the environment in which it is embedded and utilized to dynamically build innovative models of computing. The process is reciprocal like the environment can and should also become an intelligent in that it also has a capability to detect other computing devices entering it. This mutual dependency and interaction results in a new capacity of computers to act intelligently upon and within the environments in which we move. Pervasive Computing represents an area populated with sensors, pads, badges, and virtual or physical models of the physical and social/cognitive environments.

Pervasive Computing services can be built either by embedding models of specific environments into dedicated computers or more generally, by building generic capabilities into computers to inquire, detect, explore, and dynamically build models of their environments.

The Future of Pervasive Computing

Pervasive computing software empowers businesses, service providers and developers to create applications and services for a new generation of computing devices. The reality is that workstations haven't changed all that much in 30 years, despite their enormous power and performance gains. Interfacing is still a matter of pressing plastic keys and clicking on a mouse.

A time will come when a camera-equipped PC will be able to follow our gaze and shift applications with our focus. Also, imagine that the camera and microphone arrays in conference rooms will recognize us, watch us, listen to us, infer what we want and produce the information that we need, sans keyboard. Pervasive computing standards are coming up and that will enable computers and people to interact, no matter where they are.

Input interfaces for Pervasive Computing

Pervasive computing utilizes "multimodal" interfaces, and that means developing systems that can recognize voice and gestures -- systems that perceive their end users. The PC remains important in a pervasive system, and the technology could involve new ways of interfacing with a desktop, such as gaze tracking. But instead of inputting commands in front of one PC exclusively, a pervasive system extends the idea of interfacing to tens or hundreds of devices.

Pervasive Computing Applications and Challenges

The practical applications of pervasive systems vary. NIST has set up an array of microphones and cameras that can keep track of what's occurring in a conference room. With sophisticated lip-reading, gaze tracking and speech-recognition systems, the time may soon come when meeting minutes are automatically recorded and digitized, and participants can issue commands directly to employees from the meeting.

Interconnecting a wide variety of technologies that can be mobile or wearable, embedded or stationary, all performing a wide range of functions, can't be accomplished without standards.

NIST is at work on an open-source, pervasive computing standard called Smart Flow to address the underlying problem of connecting a variety of devices, systems and sensors that make up a multimodal environment. This standard is intended to let a company that makes a video, voice or location sensor, for instance, send data from that device in a standard format that could be accessed by an analyzer from another company.

Context-aware Computing

Smart rooms and workspaces assist in the seamless integration of people with computers within a physical environment. Typically furnished with networked pervasive computing devices and sensors, these rooms are designed to assist people in pursuit of everyday work goals such as finding information, collaboration with colleagues, and so on. Smart rooms are the subject of much research around the world, and a key enabler of smart rooms is the use of context awareness to link pervasive computing devices with users within their physical environment.

Context can be simply defined as that which surrounds, and gives meaning to something else. Within a smart room, context is what gives the room its understanding of the user, the user’s intention, the user’s task, and the physical environment the user is situated within. In most mobile, wearable and ubiquitous computing application, knowing the user’s location, absolutely, or relative to other parts of the environment is important for the seamless integration of people with pervasive computing devices within the physical environment

Embedded Computing

Typically, embedded computing refers to any non-personal computer system or computing device that performs a dedicated function or is designed for use with a specific embedded software application. These are closed systems, which the end user typically cannot modify. Embedded systems may include cash registers, automated teller machines, industrial controllers, server appliances, set top boxes, advanced industrial / medical / automotive / consumer electronics, avionics and specialized handheld devices

Embedded computing helps PC industry break into commerce, communication, education, transportation or entertainment filed, bringing our life to another Renaissance. Featuring high reliability, superior stability and versatile applications, embedded computer boards are irreplaceable.

What is Ubiquitous Computing (UC)?

Ubiquitous Computing is intangible – physically, figuratively, literally, living and working environments embedded with computing devices in a seamless, invisible way. True ubiquitous computing involves devices embedded transparently in our physical and social movements, integrating both Mobile and Pervasive computing.

Ubiquitous computing represents a situation in which computers will be embedded in our natural movements and interactions with our environments both physical and social. UC will help to organize and mediate social interactions wherever and whenever these situations might occur. In the next 10 years, the challenge of developing ubiquitous services will shift from demonstrating the basic concept of integrating it into the existing computing infrastructure and building widely innovative mass-scale applications that will continue the computing technology evolution.

UC Technologies

UC represents amalgamation of quite a number of existing and future technologies like Mobile computing, pervasive computing, wearable computing, embedded computing and location-, context-aware computing technologies fulfill the dream of bringing UC into reality.

UC Challenges

It is very tough at present to teach a computer about its environment. The main challenges in ubiquitous computing originate from integrating large-scale mobility with the pervasive computing functionality. In its ultimate form, ubiquitous computing means any computing device, while moving with us, can build incrementally dynamic and intelligent models of its various environments and configure its services accordingly. Furthermore, the devices will be able to either remember past environments they operated in, thus helping us to work when we reenter, or proactively build up services in new environments whenever we enter them.

The shift toward ubiquitous computing poses multiple novel technical, social, and organizational challenges. At the technical level, design and implementation of computing architectures that enable dynamic configuration of ubiquitous services on a large scale, secondly, design and develop ubiquitous services. This needs of feasible and viable architectures, design Ontologies and domain models, requirements and interaction scenarios, and analyzing new families of nonfunctional requirements such as configurability and adaptability.

Software Infrastructure and Design Challenges for UC Applications

Ubiquitous computing applications will be embedded in the user’s physical environments and integrate seamlessly with their everyday tasks.

• Task Dynamism – UC applications, by virtue of being available everywhere at all times, will have to adapt to the dynamism of users’ environments and the resulting uncertainties. In these environments, users may serendipitously change their goals or adapt their actions to a changing environment.
• Device Heterogeneity and Resource Constraints – The omnipresence of UC applications is typically achieved by either making the technological artifacts (devices) move with the user or by having the applications move between devices tracking the user. In both cases, applications have to adapt to changing technological capabilities in their environment.
• Computing in a Social Environment – Another major characteristic of UC technology is that it has a significant impact on the social environments in which it is used. An introduction of a UC environment implies the introduction of sensors, which irrevocably have an impact on the social structure.

Research Challenges

Semantic Modeling - A fundamental necessity for an adaptable and composable computing environment is the ability to describe the preferences of users and the relevant characteristics of computing components using a high-level semantic model. Ontologies can be used to describe users’ task environments, as well as their goals, to enable reasoning about a user’s needs and therefore to dynamically adapt to changes. The research challenges in semantic modeling include developing a modeling language to express the rich and complex nature of Ontologies, developing and validating Ontologies for various domains of user activity.

Building the Software Infrastructure - An effective software infrastructure for running UC applications must be capable of finding, adapting, and delivering the appropriate applications to the user’s computing environment based on the user’s context.

Developing and Configuring Applications - Currently services are being described using a standard description language and in the future, using standard Ontologies. Such semantic descriptions could enable automatic composition of services, which in turn enables an infrastructure that dynamically adapts to tasks.

Validating the user experience - The development of effective methods for testing and evaluating the usage scenarios enabled by pervasive applications is an important area that needs more attention from researchers.

Design of User Interfaces for UC

The goal of the merger of ubiquitous and wearable computing should be to provide the right information to the right person at the right place at the right time. The mobile access is the gateway technology required to make information available at any place and at any time. In addition, the computing system should be aware of the user’s context not only to be able to respond in an appropriate manner with respect to the user’s cognitive and social state but also to anticipate needs of the users.

Speech recognition, position sensing and eye tracking should be common inputs and in the future, stereographic audio and visual output will be coupled with 3D virtual reality information. In addition, heads-up projection displays should allow superposition of information onto the user’s environment.

UC Technologies Benefits

The most profound technologies are those that disappear and weave themselves into the fabric of everyday life until they are indistinguishable from it. It will have a profound effect on the way people access and use services, enabling new classes of services that only make sense by virtue of being embedded in the environment.

The possible effects of anytime/anyplace computing on the productivity of an important part of the work force known as knowledge workers are a significant area of speculation and a subject worthy of further exploration. A dramatic increase in access to data and computing by knowledge workers can be achieved technically by mobile computing devices and or by embedding computing devices in products and production technologies. Availability is achieved by embedded systems in products, processes and buildings and by allowing mobile computing input from personnel. The technology release knowledge work from the constraints of a fixed office location and fixed office hours. Knowledge workers can work with full access to communication, data and computing from any location at any time. Unlimited access to computing and communications networks also changes the processes and dynamics of the knowledge work activities of communication, coordination, document sharing, knowledge exchange, and collaboration.

Possible Beneficial Effects of Anytime/Anyplace Computing on Knowledge work

• Enhanced capabilities for communications, coordination, collaboration and knowledge exchange
• Removal of time and space constraints for doing knowledge work
• Access to critical decision makers at any time
• Increased ability to receive and process rich streams of signals about the organization and Its environment

Conclusion

The grand usage of information technology in fully automating different business, personal, social, enterprise processes gets accepted among the humanity due to its robust benefits. In that direction, a whole lot of innovative technologies (hardware and software) have come out of research labs to reduce the size of computing systems and their components, improve the performance of processors and other components of computing, storage devices, information, Web, consumer, and communication appliances. As a result, we have a world of systems and devices that can connect, communicate and interoperate together towards achieving assigned tasks successfully in a safe, seamless and secure fashion.

Towards achieving the above stated goal and vision of IT community, there are quite a number of research scientists and visionaries working together to bring out the systems architecture, software technologies such as languages, environments, protocols and tools and above all to bring out an array of killer applications. In the years ahead, there will be news and products for facilitating the world of ubiquitous computing.