Cost 219ter

Personalization of ICT products and services by means of User Profile Management

Françoise Petersen
ETSI/HF

STF 265 on User Profile Management (e-Incluision)
Funded by EC/EFTA

Behind every instance of personalization is a "user profile" that stores details of the user, their preferences and other information that can be used to deliver to the user an experience that is tailored to their individual requirements. We will present and discuss our current efforts at creating guidelines for user profile management in information and communications technologies.

STF265 (STF - Specialist Task Force) belongs to the European Telecommunications Standards Institute (ETSI) Technical Committee Human Factors, ETSI/HF. STF leader is Françoise Petersen.

Problem - Services and content may not be delivered appropriately

The problem is that services and content may not be delivered appropriately to all users in various situations using different devices with different software and hardware.

STF265 focus is on:

• users' needs
  
• multimodal, multi-device environments
  
• different situations - different needs

Why focus on users' requirements?

Goals and Benefits

• Wider use of services including universal access, e-inclusion
  
• Increase the broad demand for new services.

Proper User Profile Management will be critical to the universal acceptance and success of new and advanced communication services.
The goals and benefits are a wider use of services, including universal access and an increase of the broad demand for new services.

Electronics Communications Networks and Services

See also (below are copied parts from): www.etsi.org/t%5Fnews/0311%5Focgecns.htm

[2003-11-07] A new European regulatory framework for electronic communications networks and services entered into force on 24th April 2002. The main objectives of this framework are to create a set of rules that are sufficiently flexible to deal with changing electronic communications markets and their degree of competition. The framework further sets out well-defined tasks and procedures for National Regulatory Authorities (NRA) and harmonisation mechanisms to contribute to a consistent application of the provisions in all Member States. The goals of the framework are to encourage competition in the electronic communications markets, to improve the functioning of the internal market and to guarantee basic user interests that would not be guaranteed by market forces.
The new European regulatory framework consists of five Directives: the Framework Directive, the Authorisation Directive, the Universal service Directive, the Access Directive and the Directive on privacy and electronic communications, complemented by a Spectrum Decision. Member States

Outcome - An ETSI Guide (EG)

The outcome of the STF265 work is an ETSI Guide (EG) that will provide recommendations and guidance to solve the common issues of user profile management in both personal and business applications. The ETSI Guide will be useful for standardisation work at standardization bodies, and also of use to manufacturers, service providers, service developers and device developers

Application fields

• Communications
  
• Services
  
• Devices

The application fields are communications, services, devices including web.

Why User Profiles?

User profiles are about personalization!

Do we wish the situation to be like the picture above? Compare today's services to the toy here where the child has to fit in blocks (in this case people - the users) in predefined shapes. The user shown above has no choice but to be shaped like a triangle.

Instead, I would prefer personal and efficient services. Services should suit user's needs instead of users suiting the predefined shapes/services.

User profiles can be used to deliver personal and efficient products and services that reflect users' unique lifestyles and situations.

What is a User Profile?

A user profile contains user and context information used to deliver appropriate services and content, in a format tailor-made to the user's needs.

More technically, user profiles contain data describing:

1. The user's preferences including

• characteristics
  
• abilities
  
• needs.

2. Settings, rules and state changes related to

• user profile management system
• services
  
• terminals
  
• communications

Where are the profiles?

Users will not have to think of where their profile data is stored. A profile tool will do that for them and offer an interface that is easy to understand and use.

The reality may be more complex and the profile information may be stored and distributed at different locations such as in a mobile phone, PC, PDA, Smart Card, services, servers on the internet and be available centrally from profile providers.

Profile Tool

A profile tool can be used for defining their user profiles. There may be several versions of the tool, but most users would probably prefer to use a PC based, graphical user interface for managing their profiles.

The profile tool can give the user access to the following:

• user profiles
  
• address book - for defining preferences related to people in your contact book
  
• log tool
  
• templates - there are templates for some typical users and user situations, and the templates contain good default values, that can later be fine-tuned to suit the user needs better.

Example - Multimodality

Special need - listen to text
This example illustrates a wider view of "special needs", which is normally addressing the needs of disabled people or children. This example shows how visually impaired people and young children who cannot yet read both have a preference "listen to text" The permanent profile "Listen to Text"/"Blind" would provide the young child or visually impaired person with this service.

The example also shows that the special need "listen to text" applies to a person driving a car who will obviously prefer listening to text. The situation-dependent profile "Car" provides the person with this service. This situation-dependent profile "Car" may be automatically activated when the driver uses the car handsfree and an event is sent to trigger the automatic activation.

Situation dependent profiles

Profiles related to specific situations and/or user roles needs to be active.
However, there are some problems. People may forget to activate a suitable profile or they forget to "reset" to a suitable profile and, honestly, I admit that I am a bit lazy. I do not want to manually activate my profiles several times a day.

The consequence if the wrong profile is active may be a very poor outcome.

So, what is the solution?

Automatic activation of profiles

A key solution to the problem of people forgetting to manually activate or de-activate their different profiles as their situation changes is automatic activation of profiles. Users could define activation rules according to their activities and make use of different means such as events from:

• time schedules
  
• accessories
  
• external applications
  
• physical sensor/transmitter
  
• location based services

Example - Profiles with automatic activation

Example - Profiles with automatic activation (A day-in-the-life)

House: Your home profile is active and communications are directed to your home fixed phone. You may also have various settings related to different products at home (e.g. "preferred language" for communications and for spoken language and subtitles in films)…
Leave house: Your intelligent key activates the "Out" profile, door and shutters are closed, the alarm is activated, heating is set to energy-saving mode, and communications are directed to your mobile phone…

Driving: Your intelligent car key (or "mobile hands free") activates your "Driving" profile, calls are now directed to the car mobile, emails will be spoken, seat and mirrors are adjusted, favourite radio channel is selected…

Arrive at Office: When your mobile phone is put in the desk charger it activates your "Office" profile. The "large fonts" preference is activated on the PC, your preferred language is set, calls will be directed to your office fixed phone…

Meeting: Your on-line agenda says meeting Thursday 14-16 and activates the meeting profile at that time. The meeting profile sets your mobile phone to silent mode, calls will be directed to voice mail but an exception is made that allows your most important client to phone as you hope to sign an important contract very soon.
…
Driving home from work: as Driving above, plus the heating of your home is set to Comfort.
…
Night: A time schedule saying that from 22.00- 07.00 Sun to Thu, 23.45-9.00 Fri, Sat: No calls allowed, heating should be set to "Energy saving mode", shutters will be closed.

COST219ter scenarios

The Making Life Easier (draft version 01/03/05) describes two scenarios related to Bill who is 24 years old and who has a severe hearing loss. These are:

"Bill uses a mobile video phone to communicate in sign language via a relay service to book an appointment with the dentist."

"Bill uses an automated system which recognises his sign language and converts to speech in a choice of languages."

From this it is clear that Bill has access to two alternative ways of using sign language to communicate with people or services that expect spoken communication.

COST219ter scenarios without profile

1. Bill will have to make a decision about which of the services to use each time he makes a communication to a person or service that expects spoken communication.

2. Having made the decision, he will have to remember how to access each of these services and then enter details of the person or service he wants to communicate with.

COST219ter scenarios with profile

If Bill has a user profile, this can contain details of the method for accessing each of the sign-language to speech services. This profile can also contain rules that express Bill's preferences for when he uses each service. These rules can be used to automatically choose the appropriate service to use, based on Bill's judgement about when it may be worth using the more costly human-mediated relay service and when the cheaper automatic service would be best.

The example above shows:
Bill's address book associated with Bill's profile tool identifies the person Bill wishes to communicate with as a friend and chooses the cheaper automatic service.

The rules about which service to use may take into account a large range of factors, including:

• the role that Bill is currently in (e.g. if he is in his business role and his company wishes him to have the best possible communication with business customers they will be willing to pay for the dearer relay service);
  
• the identity of the person Bill is communicating with (e.g. Bill's best friends may understand and tolerate the inferior quality of communications via the automated service as they realise that it is saving him money);
  
• the language preference of the person Bill is contacting (e.g. if Bill's relay service is English language only and the person Bill contacts is German, then it will be essential to use the automated multi-language service).
  
• In the above examples, the User Profile Agent that processes the rules in Bill's User Profile will need to communicate with various communications services and networks to achieve what Bill requires.

When a Universal Communications Identifier (UCI) is used, the Personal User Agent (PUA) that controls Bill's communications will take care of all of the communications complexities. In particular, in the example in the last bullet, Bill's PUA will communicate with the PUA of Bill's German contact and discover that this contact speaks German (and not English). Without this PUA to PUA communication, specifying the correct output language would be something that Bill would have to do himself (if he was aware that the person he was contacting only spoke German). If Bill and the person he was contacting did not use UCI and Bill did not know that he only spoke German and he might choose to use the English language relay service. In such a case, everybody involved in the attempted communication would be very frustrated and embarrassed.

Goals and benefits

• Interworking and interoperability of the user profile for:
  
  • different services, networks and in multi-device environments
    
• Harmonization and synchronization of user profiles related to:
  
  • applications, user demands, available technologies, situations and environments
    
  • consistent data
    
  • define once
    
• Access to ICT for all users e.g.
  
  • novice/experienced
    
  • the mobile worker
    
  • young/elderly
    
  • disabled
    
• Simplify the learning process allowing reuse of knowledge for managing
  
  • different terminal devices and services -> easier adoption of new technologies.
• Enhancing the effectiveness of the response they get when contacting emergency services
• Special situations - access to information Legitimate law enforcement access, under specific judicial guidelines. An example is when a child is kidnapped and the police want to use data in their profile such as when a specific profile has been used or access location information.
  
  • Legitimate law enforcement access, under specific judicial guidelines.

Related work

• 3GPP - GUP - Generic User Profiles
  
• OMA - UAProf - User Agent Profile
  
• TISPAN
  
  • UCI in WG4
    
  • Organization of user data in WG2
    
• HF, Human Factors
  
  • User-oriented handling of multicultural issues in ICT
    
  • Kids
    
  • TeleCare
    
  • DUST
    
• EU projects such as ePerSpace
  
• USER
  
  • usergroups
    
• AT
  
  • NGN@Home
    
• Universities
  
• EMTEL, MESA...
  
• CEN smartcards...
  
• DVB Digital Video Broadcasting
  
• Platforms such as OSGI alliance, www.osgi.org

Welcome to Workshop 22-23 March

Personalization of ICT products and services by means of User Profile Management

Part II - Confirming the guidelines and further need for standardization

See also invitation and more info about the workshop at:
portal.etsi.org/STFs/documents/STF265/workshop20050322/invitation.doc

New WI and STF proposal

"User profile management standardization"

• The deliverable will be an ETSI Standard that will standardize:
  
  • objects (including settings, values, operations and relations) related to user profile management;
    
  • rule definition language for defining automatic activation of profiles;
    
  • common terminology.
    
• ETSI Member organisations supporting new WI and proposal of funded STF on "User profile management standardization": BT, ANEC, Siemens, Norwegian P&T authority and Nokia

Newsletter

Would you like to get the newsletter about our work? It is sent out about once a month. Send an email to Francoise.Petersen@apica.com saying that you wish to get the newsletter.

Further information

Francoise.Petersen@apica.com
portal.etsi.org/STFs/HF/STF265.asp

Mail List: HF_User_Profile_Management@list.etsi.org
To subscribe: list.etsi.org/HF_USER_PROFILE_MANAGEMENT.html

 

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