Designing smart homes

The area of smart homes is fast developing as an emergent area which attracts the synergy of several areas of science. This volume offers a collection of contributions addressing how artificial intelligence (AI), one of the core areas of computer science, can bring the growing area of smart homes to a higher level of functionality where homes can truly realize the long standing dream of proactively helping their inhabitants in an intelligent way. After an introductory section to describe a smart home scenario and to provide some basic terminology, the following 9 sections turn special attention to a particular exemplar application scenario (provision of healthcare and safety related services to increase the quality of life) exploring the application of specific areas of AI to this scenario.