A context-sensitive service discovery protocol for mobile computing environments

Service discovery is important in mobile and pervasive computing environments, where the set of resources available to an entity changes dynamically over time. This paper describes a novel context-sensitive approach to service discovery, whereby queries and advertisements can be issued in a context-sensitive manner by using techniques such as query completion, query relaxation, preferences and query persistence. We show how context-aware query completion and query result ranking, when considered together with primitives defined in a query language, allow the construction of context-aware applications and reduce message overhead by producing more relevant query results. The elements of this context-sensitive service discovery protocol are showcased within a shopping centre carpark assistant application.