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The
goal of the SMS project is to create innovative tools enabling
a new class of services, addressing the specific needs
of mobile users and enabling individuals and small businesses
to become service providers. We call these services Simple Mobile
Services (SMS).
If mobile services are to repeat the success of the Web they have
to be simple to find, simple to use, simple to
trust and simple to set up. These are our design goals
for SMS. Like the Web, SMS will provide technology and operator-independent
end-to-end connectivity. But unlike conventional Web-based services
they will target specific locations visited by specific
classes of mobile user with specific needs.
The overarching concept driving SMS is simplicity. SMS will be simple
to find: precise targeting of services to specific users and
locations will drastically reduce the burden of locating and choosing
between services. They will be easy to use: SMS will be terminal
and network independent; service design and deployment will be based
on a platform independent model (e.g., MDA); authentication and
configuration will be automatic; user interfaces and content will
adapt automatically to the characteristics of the terminal; services
will maintain the same basic logic as users move between environments
and networks.
They will be easy to set-up: the tools used for service authoring
will be no more complex than current Web authoring tools; adaptation
to user context and policies will take place at run time. SMS
are a sub-class in the broader family of context-sensitive services
- a key element in the IST vision of "ubiquitous", "pervasive" computing.
The key technologies required for SMS are already in place. The
key obstacle to service deployment is not technology but the lack
of standards and standards-based tools - and more important still
- the absence of the millions of small providers who have driven
the Internet explosion.
It is these obstacles that we address in the SMS proposal.
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