Detecting Context in Distributed Sensor Networks by Using Smart Context-Aware Packets

Context modeling and detection will play a major role for pervasive computing. This paper proposes an approach to reveal the user's context in a self-organized sensor network without a central point of control. A uniform communication scheme, referred to as Smart Context-Aware Packet's (sCAP's), allows single sensors to share sensed data and to cooperate in order to build a meaningful context model from manifold inputs. In this approach, sCAP's are injected into the sensor network by the context inquirer. In particular, sCAP's contain a retrieving plan specifying which types of sensors should be visited to obtain the desired context information. The paper concentrates on the routing concepts which allow to deal with breakdowns of sensor nodes and continuous changes of the network topology.