Abstract

As a new technology for communication enriches, users are often overwhelmed not only by the technology itself but also by the information that comes with it. Especially, message receivers become more vulnerable to interruption of their normal workflow than the past, as there has been such an increase in the number and volume of messages received. People need to keep their attention focused on their mainline task by minimizing interruptions from unnecessary messages. One possible solution to tackle this problem is to give users a personalized control of messages according to their current contexts. The purpose of this study is to develop an agent-based architecture based on the blackboard communication model that captures a user's contexts to enhance a user's control over the incoming messages. Some of the strengths of using the blackboard communication model are the ability to separate the concerns among the agents and to allow for the replacement of one agent with another agent that might be more effective in doing the intended functionality. In the proposed system architecture, the core parts are: characterizing and representing the user's context, allowing the user to set rules of preference dynamically, and managing the delivery of incoming messages. As a result, this system enables users to receive messages according to the paradigm, 'where you are', 'what you are doing', 'when a message arrives', 'who is calling', and what you want to do with the incoming message in the current context