Challenges in engineering intelligent environments

This issue of JAISE is focused on the theme of Challenges in Engineering Intelligent Environments. Since the inception of ubiquitous computing, the difficulties in deploying computing systems in our everyday environments have been recognized. Computing resources, electrical power consumption, visibility, networking, wireless tools, user interfaces, ad hoc infrastructures, security and other issues of concern have long been targets of continued research and engineering efforts. Intelligent Environments have been strong candidates for bringing limited prototype/pilot versions of the ubiquitous computing concept into everyday use. Applications in the fields of healthcare, automation, education, energy efficiency, and working environments have all seen notable successes. As 'big data‘ and large scale analytics have been brought to bear on these types of tools, new issues relating to data storage, machine learning, and privacy have been exposed. The research community targeting these fields has repeatedly sought high quality engineering solutions to problems arising in smart environments. This thematic issue was proposed and compiled to bring together exemplars of problems engineering teams face, the research approaches to building better smart environments, and to enhance awareness of how these problems might be overcome. The editors have sought out papers in areas including: middleware, software engineering, machine learning, sensors and systems, and user experience to demonstrate the diversity of methodologies and technologies being applied to solve smart environment problems. With the new push towards achieving the 'Internet of Things‘ (IoT) paradigm, addressing and surmounting these issues become ever more important. The Guest Editors of this JAISE thematic issue, Gordon Hunter, Aaron Crandall and Asier Aztiria, have sought to make this a relevant, timely and interesting collection of articles for the Ambient Intelligence and Smart Environments community. We cannot show the full scope of the work being done to overcome engineering challenges in smart environments in a single issue of the journal, and we look forward to hearing from readers about other areas and problems that need addressing if the field is to truly bring smart environments to achieve their full promise and potential in our daily lives.