Ad-hoc community context awareness for mobile device

A method for determining context for a first mobile computing device, the method comprising:

• storing, by the first mobile computing device, current context representing a current user activity or environment in which the first mobile computing device is used;
• generating, by the first mobile computing device, a query for transmission to a remote community context service;
• obtaining, by the first mobile computing device, community context information from the remote community context service, the community context information being based on a remote context determination of a second mobile computing device determined to be similarly situated to the first mobile computing device according to community membership criteria;
• and
• updating, by the first mobile computing device, the indication of the current context based on the community context information.

At least one non-transitory computer-readable storage medium containing instructions that, when executed on computing hardware of a server, cause the server to perform operations comprising:

• storing reported context received from a plurality of remote mobile computing devices;
• classifying the remote mobile computing devices into a plurality of ad-hoc communities based on reported current locations of the remote mobile computing devices;
• receiving a community-context request from a first mobile computing device;
• classifying the first mobile computing device into a first ad-hoc community of the plurality of ad-hoc communities based on a location of the first mobile computing device;
• retrieving a portion of the reported context that corresponds to a second mobile computing device classified in the first ad-hoc community;
• and
• sending community-context information to the first mobile computing device, the community-context information being based on the portion of the reported context.