An Ontology-Based Actuator Discovery and Invocation Framework in Home Care Systems

Citation

Wang F & Turner KJ (2009) An Ontology-Based Actuator Discovery and Invocation Framework in Home Care Systems. In: Mokhtari M, Khalil I, Bauchet J, Zhang D & Nugent C (eds.) Ambient Assistive Health and Wellness Management in the Heart of the City: 7th International Conference on Smart Homes and Health Telematics, ICOST 2009, Tours, France, July 1-3, 2009. Proceedings. Lecture Notes in Computer Science. Berlin: Springer, pp. 66-73. http://www.springerlink.com/content/978-3-642-02867-0; https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-02868-7_9

Abstract
Home care systems need to be personalised to meet individual needs, and must be easily adjusted as the user's symptoms develop. Care policies (i.e. Event-Condition-Action rules) can be used to specify care services, facilitating changes in the behaviour of a home care system. Context modelling allows a user to specify the trigger and conditions of a care policy, using high-level context rather than raw sensor data. The actions of a care policy are, however, still dependent on the implementations details of actuators. We propose a framework that allows the actions of a care policy to be specified abstractly using human-understandable concepts. The framework takes care of discovering and using specific actuators, hiding the low-level home networking details from ordinary users. It therefore makes personalisation and modification of home care systems more accessible to ordinary users, requiring very little technical knowledge.

Keywords
Assisted Living; Home Care; Ontology; Service Discovery; Service Invocation; Home care services Management