From Smart Buildings to Smart Vehicles: Mobile User Interfaces for Multi-Environment Interactions

We introduce the concept of multi-environment interactions in the context of smart cities, spanning smart environments of diverse kinds, from smart buildings to smart vehicles. The primary goal of multi-environment interactions is effective control of computer systems in those environments in a manner that is uniform and consistent to their users. In our approach, users interact with and control devices and services from smart environments through one application running on their personal mobile devices. We present the engineering details of our mobile application and discuss its multi-environment orientation through the prism of design heuristics relevant for the user experience of ubiquitous computing applied to smart cities. Furthermore, to demonstrate the utility of multi-environment interactions in this context, we present two practical use cases involving smart buildings and smart vehicles, respectively, where users control ambient light, sound, and airflow.