Mobile Task Computing: Beyond Location-Based Services and EBooks

Mobile devices are a promising platform for content delivery considering the (i) variety of attached sensors, (ii) widespread availability of wireless networks, (iii) even increasing screen estate and hardware specs. What has been missing so far is the adequate coupling of content to those devices and their users’ actions. This is especially apparent in the area of Location-based Services (LBS), which, with few exceptions (e.g., navigation), have not fulfilled their predicted commercial success in mobile environments due to the following reasons: (i) content in typical LBS applications is still narrow and static, (ii) available methods and interfaces in mobile handsets for the discovery of available content are at best cumbersome (e.g., keyword-type search), and (iii) existing structured content available in LBS applications is hard to reuse. In this work, we propose the concept of task computing to complement and extend LBS as a means to enable the intuitive and efficient re-purpose, discovery, and delivery of rich content according to the user’s needs. Further, we establish the theoretical foundations of task computing and its application in the LBS domain. We also present a fully functional prototype iPhone application structured around the concept of task computing.