Location Based Service Extensions for General Communications and Application Enablement

The advent of smartphones and the availability of user context data are constantly evolving wireless applications. The old centralized model in which applications were created by service providers and hosted within network elements is being replaced with a dynamic and distributed model of user-centric, context-driven (location, time, presence, terminal status) applications developed by a vigorous development community. In order for service providers to capitalize on this wave, a new network application model is needed for the service provider to add value while selectively managing and distributing critical context data. In this paper we examine the use of location context data as a primary mode of communication. A generalized processing model is illustrated with seven classes of location based applications. (C) 2011 Alcatel-Lucent.