A Vague Research Plan

I've been wondering how to know whether we've "captured the context" of the patient in our system. It seems as though we'd need another source to confirm that the determined or computed context is indeed the actual context. And this leads me to believe that we should ask the user to describe their situation from time to time.

To enhance a DTN, our system needs to provide any application with information to make a decision regarding the state of the network and the available energy. When a message needs to be sent, there's a question of whether to transfer it now using whatever means are available, to wait for better opportunities (requiring less energy or having a higher probability of deliver), or to panic and declare it's not worth it to attempt delivery of the message (no network or contact is going to be available in time, there's not enough power). The question is to determine the inputs to that decision making process and to determine how correct it is at making that decision.

For the final piece, we'll need to slice the system in half such that the tetherless care application falls to one side and the tetherless care middleware to the other and then glue the two back together with an API. Where there is an infinite number of ways to do this, we have to determine a good one. The problem here is that I don't yet know how to necessarily prove 'good'.

There are a set of properties we'd like this middleware to possess:

Easy to Develop Tetherless Care Applications

It should be easy to incorporate the system's pieces into a range of tetherless care applications.

Modular

Individual components should be replaceable if alternative or improved functionality is desired.

Versatile

It should support a wide range of use cases and potential applications.

I don't yet see how to scientifically demonstrate that these have been met. At best, it seems I can show a proof of concept.

New Questions

Three questions I need to answer:

Can we develop an abstraction to capture context and situations of the tetherless patient that can be efficiently implemented on a resource constrained device?

Is it possible to enhance DTN networks to exchange information between tetherless patients and healthcare professionals in a reliable and timely fashion?

Is it possible to seamlessly integrate these functional components into a coherent framework to support tetherless care?

Update

I predictably failed to keep up on this all this year. Nevertheless, I've been making progress (finally!!!).
I proposed my thesis topic at the beginning of November, and sort of passed that milestone. I say "sort of" because the idea I proposed was good, but my intended research plan lacked focus and was far too much work.... criticism with which I can agree. At least, the last two and a half years of putting that together weren't a complete waste.

I was told and have heard before that a synthesis of parts is an acceptable contribution for a Ph.D, and that I can narrow my focus down to the construction of a proof-of-concept prototype for tetherless care (side note: we moved from referring to "the tetherless patient" to "tetherless care"). The prototype must be context aware and operate despite communication challenges (think crappy WiFi and 3G/4G signals).

What lingers in my mind is the role of experimentation in this process. What needs to be tested when you're putting building blocks together.