Human-Computer Cloud and Its Applications in E-Tourism

Abstract

The chapter addresses two problems that typically arise during the creation of decision support systems that include humans in the information processing workflow, namely, resource management and complexity of decision support in dynamic environments, where it is impossible (or impractical) to implement all possible information processing workflows that can be useful for a decision-maker. The chapter proposes the concept of human-computer cloud, providing typical cloud features (elasticity, on demand resource provisioning) to the applications that require human input (so-called human-based applications) and, on top of resource management functionality, a facility for building information processing workflows for ad hoc tasks in an automated way. The chapter discusses main concepts lying behind the proposed cloud environment, as well as its architecture and some implementation details. It is also shown how the proposed human-computer cloud environment solves information and decision support demands in the dynamic and actively developing area of e-tourism.