In most cases, development of Web-based systems has been ad hoc, lacking systematic approach and quality control and assurance procedures. Hence, there is now legitimate and growing concern about the manner in which Web-based systems are developed and their long-term quality and integrity. Web Engineering, an emerging new discipline, advocates a process and a systematic approach to development of high quality Web-based systems. It promotes the establishment and use of sound scientific, engineering and management principles, and disciplined and systematic approaches to development, deployment and maintenance of Web-based systems. This paper gives an introductory overview on Web Engineering. It presents the principles and roles of Web Engineering, assesses the similarities and differences between development of traditional software and Web-based systems, identifies key Web engineering activities and reviews some of the ongoing work in this area. It also highlights the prospects of Web engineering and the areas that need further study.

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PurposeUbiquitous web applications (UWA) are a new type of web applications which are accessed in various contexts, i.e. through different devices, by users with various interests, at anytime from anyplace around the globe. For such full‐fledged, complex software systems, a methodologically sound engineering approach in terms of model‐driven engineering (MDE) is crucial. Several modeling approaches have already been proposed that capture the ubiquitous nature of web applications, each of them having different origins, pursuing different goals and providing a pantheon of concepts. This paper aims to give an in‐depth comparison of seven modeling approaches supporting the development of UWAs.Design/methodology/approachThis methodology is conducted by applying a detailed set of evaluation criteria and by demonstrating its applicability on basis of an exemplary tourism web application. In particular, five commonly found ubiquitous scenarios are investigated, thus providing initial insight into the modeling concepts of each approach as well as to facilitate their comparability.FindingsThe results gained indicate that many modeling approaches lack a proper MDE foundation in terms of meta‐models and tool support. The proposed modeling mechanisms for ubiquity are often limited, since they neither cover all relevant context factors in an explicit, self‐contained, and extensible way, nor allow for a wide spectrum of extensible adaptation operations. The provided modeling concepts frequently do not allow dealing with all different parts of a web application in terms of its content, hypertext, and presentation levels as well as their structural and behavioral features. Finally, current modeling approaches do not reflect the crosscutting nature of ubiquity but rather intermingle context and adaptation issues with the core parts of a web application, thus hampering maintainability and extensibility.Originality/valueDifferent from other surveys in the area of modeling web applications, this paper specifically considers modeling concepts for their ubiquitous nature, together with an investigation of available support for MDD in a comprehensive way, using a well‐defined as well as fine‐grained catalogue of more than 30 evaluation criteria.

In the domain of emergency management, in addition to the constant technical skill-upgrade required by the nature of the humanitarian context, the importance of an appropriate training is widely recognized. In particular, giving responders information technology skills so that they are well prepared to address health, security and managerial concerns represents a key factor by which the goal of an efficient and effective humanitarian emergency response can be pursued. In this paper we propose the adoption of augmented reality mobile interfaces to enhance the training efficacy for on-site crisis preparedness activities. The system we propose originated from the idea to allow trainees to exploit Augmented Reality (AR) interaction and become quickly familiar with the mobile technology adopted today in emergency response activities

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Abstract. Farmers in Sri Lanka are badly affected by not being able to get vital information required to support their farming activities in a timely manner. Some of the required information can be found in government websites, agriculture department leaflets, and through radio and television programs on agriculture. Due to its unstructured and varied format, and lack of targeted delivery methods, this knowledge is not reaching the farmers. Therefore, this knowledge needs to be provided not only in a structured way, but also in a context-specific manner. To address this shortcoming an international collaborative research project was launched to develop a Social Life Network to provide necessary information to farmers using mobile devices. Agricultural information has strong local characteristics in relation to climate, culture, history, languages, and local plant varieties. These local characteristics as well as the need to provide information in a context-specific manner made us to develop an ontology for agriculture. In this paper we present the approach we used to derive contextual information related to the farmers and the ontological approach that we developed to meet information needs of the farmers at various stages of the farming life cycle.