Context aware observation of human activities

Interactive environments combine perception, action and communication to extend human-computer interaction. We believe that a fundamental challenge for interactive environments is developing models and methods for "context awareness". We present an ontology for context awareness for interactive environments. We show how the elements of this ontology correspond to the elements of a software architecture for observing situation and context. Within this framework, context predicts the evolution of the situation, and provides "meaning" for objects and events. Context also provides a specification for assembling federations of processes to measure properties, determine relations and detect events.