Dipl.-Inform. Joachim Wolfgang Kaltz :

An Engineering Method for Adaptive, Context-aware Web Applications

Dissertation angenommen durch: Universität Duisburg-Essen, Campus Duisburg, Fakultät für Ingenieurwissenschaften, Abteilung Informatik, Informations- und Medientechnik, 2006-07-18

BetreuerIn: Prof. Dr.-Ing. Jürgen Ziegler , Universität Duisburg-Essen, Campus Duisburg, Fakultät für Ingenieurwissenschaften, Abteilung Informatik, Informations- und Medientechnik

GutachterIn: Prof. Dr.-Ing. Jürgen Ziegler , Universität Duisburg-Essen, Campus Duisburg, Fakultät für Ingenieurwissenschaften, Abteilung Informatik, Informations- und Medientechnik
GutachterIn: Prof. Dr. rer. soc. Heinz Ulrich Hoppe , Universität Duisburg-Essen, Campus Duisburg, Fakultät für Ingenieurwissenschaften, Abteilung Informatik, Informations- und Medientechnik

Schlüsselwörter in Englisch: Web Engineering, context-awareness, model-driven development

Abstrakt in Englisch

This dissertation addresses the question of how context-awareness can be applied in a general-purpose, systematic process for Web application development: that is, in a Web Engineering process. A model for representing an application's context factors in ontologies is presented. A general-purpose methodology for Web Engineering is extended to account for context, by putting in relation context ontologies with elements of the application domain. The application model is extended with adaptation specifications, defining at which places in the application adaptation to context is to occur, and according to what strategy.

Application and context models are system interpretable, in order to support automatic adaptation of a system's behavior during its operation, that is, consequently to user requests. Requirements for a corresponding Web software architecture for context are established first at the conceptual level, then specifically in a content-based architecture based on an XML stack. The CATWALK software framework, an implementation of an architecture enabling adaptation to context is described. The framework provides mechanisms for interpreting application and context models to generate an adaptive application, meaning to generate responses to user requests, where the generation process makes decisions based on context information.