The problem is that when we get more and more gadgets that is aware of my presence status or that subscribe to my buddy-list (for one or another reason) the task of updating presence status gets overwhelming. This will in itself limit the actual usage of presence information outside today's Y!, MSN, etc. With a way to automatically have applications being aware that using the applications have a specific presence meaning. Then I am relieved from the task of keeping my presence status updated all the time and that task is handed over to software to do it automagically.
Before you say that this is really not what I want, let's list some good things that this would enable:
- Gadgets can update the rest of the world with my presence status automatically.
- My buddies will have my correct presence status.
- With a more correct presence status other applications can emerge that make use of the new trustworthier information.
- I don't have to bother about continuously updating my current doings.
First let me give you an example of what I mean:
In today's world my PC is aware of when I'm using it and sets my status to "Available" when I'm using it and to "Away" when I have not been using it for a certain amount of time. The next wave would be to have my phone company set my status to "On the Phone" when someone calls me and similar applications like Video-on-demand. What would be of more interest is if my phone could know if I'm sitting still or moving (in or out of office perhaps) and then automatically update my status. Or if the game I'm playing could let people know that I'm actually not available even though I'm at my PC. And so on for an endless number of applications.
What is needed to make this happen?
Well, first of all you and I need to ask for this and similar functionality. We are already doing it for Instant Messaging and the proponents of IMS and SIP are hoping we will be doing it for the telecom domain as well. I certainly hope it will become as prevailing when using my phone as it is with instant messaging today. The next step after this is to make presence information as ubiquitous in all applications regardless of domain as it is today in the IM world. To make this happen we would need a couple of things to be in place:
- A configuration repository of which presence status I have when doing a certain activity
- A generic API for applications to access this repository
- Or a mediator that interprets what I'm doing with my configuration in the repository
- Applications and gadgets make use of the repository to publish presence information automatically
