A semiotic approach to ad-hoc networked environments

The aim of the work in this thesis is to develop a new approach of interacting with adhoc networked environments. These are networks where devices connect on demand with no underlying network infrastructure. The intention of this work is to develop these environments so that devices and services on these networks can publish their services, query for other services and connect with each other when required. The devices need to be able to perform these actions without prior knowledge of each other, therefore a theory of communication, semiotics, is presented. Ad-hoc networks provide an appropriate test-bed for this application of semiotics as they allow services to `know' about each other and communicate with one another. By using semiotics, we aim to create a representation of communication that allows a system to communicate within the networked environment and ask for services and connections as well as interact with users and provide. This way a user can demand something from the surrounding environment and the elements within this environment can communicate with each other to provide the service the user required. To create an effective model for this representation, various research areas will be discussed such as smart environments, natural language processing, multicast environments and human computer interaction. Principles will be used from all these areas to implement an approach of interacting with smart environments. Different types of smart environments, such as as smart homes and m-commerce environments, will be used to observe how di erent contexts a ect communication. A prototype system was realised for proof of concept and evaluated by subjects. This work highlighted the feasibility of this approach and opened a new area worthwhile of further research.