Context for Multimedia Services Adaptation

Due to the heterogeneity and complexity of user environments, multimedia services and multimedia content in the communication domain, adaptation is of a paramount importance to interoperability. Adaptation decisions at the different stages of multimedia services delivery to the end user depends on contextual information, i.e. metadata that characterises the situation of entities involved in the interaction between the user and multimedia services. This paper presents how the Adaptation Manager processes and models contextual information, and how it complements the decision taking framework defined by MPEG-21 DIA. The use of important standards and technologies such as MPEG-21 DIA, XML, Description Logics and OWL is explained.