The Wifi Alliance presents a new certification program-- Wifi Aware, a means to validate the capability for energy-efficient, proxy-based service discovery among wifi-enabled devices.
In other words, it allows devices to discover other devices, applications and information nearby before making a wifi connection. The system continuously scans surroundings, anticipates actions and notifies users of available services and selected preferences.
The alliance adds the Wifi Aware operates indoors and in dense environments, and does not require cellular, wifi or GPS connectivity. Instead it makes use of small, power-efficient messages to create a common "heartbeat" between devices before an app initiates wifi connection to follow-up on activities such as photo sharing or multiplayer games.