Serving ubiquitous users

Position paper for the Ubiquitous Web Workshop, by Charles McCathieNevile and Hallvord R. M. Steen, Opera Software

The ubiquitous user

Mobile phones, PDAs and the continuous development of digital equipment for the home creates high expectations for digital content delivery. The ubiquitous web evolves around the expectations of users who want to interact with information and services from anywhere.

The ubiquitous web

The web delivers and integrates

• Information
• Services
• User data

Information delivery is generally well understood while great progress is being made on services. Enabling services and applications often involve user data: my E-mail, my blog posts, my photos, my videos, my contacts and social network, my schedule, my documents, my bookmarks - all ubiquitously available to me online. We imagine this interactive aspect will be a key attraction for users.

The ubiquitous user agent

• Running on a wide range of devices: desktop computers, PDAs, mobile phones, TV sets..
• Enabling user data interaction through services and web applications
• Transforming content based on very precise understanding of target device's capabilities
• Independence of operating system enables scripting-based applications on any device
• Standards compatible