Context-based heterogeneous middleware integration

The use of context provision middleware is a promising approach to deal with the low-level functions involved in handling contextual events when building ubiquitous applications. Several middleware are currently available that provide support for context handling, each one adopting different models both to interact with applications and to represent contextual data. We present OpenCOPI (Open COntext Platform Integration), a platform that integrates several context provision middleware systems, providing a unified ontology-based context service for ubiquitous applications. OpenCOPI encapsulates the underlying middleware platforms and represents them as services to be provided to client applications thus facilitating the development of ubiquitous applications. This paper presents the OpenCOPI architecture, main implementation issues, and a case study that discusses the use of OpenCOPI in a ubiquitous scenario.