From Computing and Software Wiki

Contents 1 Introduction 2 Types of Context in HCI 2.1 User Context 2.2 Time Context 2.3 Physical Context 2.4 Computing Context 3 Context-Aware Computing 4 Context-Aware Applications 5 Examples of HCI Contexts 5.1 Mobile Devices 5.2 Consumer Devices 5.3 Business Applications 5.4 World Wide Web 5.5 Collaboration Systems 5.6 Games 6 See Also 7 References 8 Further Reading 9 External Links

Introduction

• In Human Computer Interaction studies, the context describes the actual conditions under which the software system is used. Determining the context of the system means describing how the software system interacts with the user in normal day to day situations. It is important to carry out usability tests, prototyping sessions, meetings, user studies and other "user-dependent sessions" in the correct context of the system to get the most accurate results from your findings. In context-aware software systems, determining the context of use can allow the application to modify it's current behaviour to better interact with the user.
• Context information will typically include anything that can be used to characterize the situation of the user, system or any other relevant entities. Context can be decomposed into disjoint categories or types to help define the context of the software system. Although these context types may differ by opinion, the most commonly recognized are the User context, Time context, Physical context as well as the Computing Context. These four types of context are described below.

Types of Context in HCI

User Context

• The user context(also known as personal context) represents information about the end-user, which interacts with the system.
• This includes information such as the user profile (age, preferences, etc.), the user’s location (e.g. absolute position, indoors, outdoors, etc.) and orientation, nearby objects, the people nearby and the social situation.

Time Context

• The time context covers relevant information related to time such as absolute time, date, day of the week and season.

Physical Context

• The physical context includes everything, which is measurable in the environment of the system with which the user interacts.
• This includes temperatures, noise levels, lighting situations, traffic conditions, etc.

Computing Context

• The computing context contains everything related to computational resources.
• This can include things such as available networks, network bandwidth, communication costs and nearby computational resources such as printers or fax machines.

Context-Aware Computing

Context-Aware Applications

Examples of HCI Contexts

Mobile Devices

Consumer Devices

Business Applications

World Wide Web

Collaboration Systems

Games

See Also

References

• Anind K. Dey and Gregory D. Abowd. Towards a Better Understanding of context and context-awareness. Technical Report GIT-GVU-99-22, Georgia Institute of Technology, College of Computing, June 1999
• Chen, G. and D. Kotz, A Survey of Context-Aware Mobile Computing Research. 2000, Dartmouth College

Further Reading

External Links