In a distributed system having a plurality of equipment that are interconnected
over transmission medium and that include one or more arithmetic units, any of
the plurality of equipment notifies a person to be notified about a function of
the any of the equipment in accordance with an adaptive communication method in
which the notification method is determined by the following steps. A first step
that any of the plurality of equipment obtains environment information of that
equipment and another equipment if necessary and a second step that any of the
equipment determines the notification method depending on the environment information
obtained by the first step and a contents of information concerning the function
of any of the equipment.
