30.04.2008
Today´s lecture
14:15 Agent Technologies by Ismar Slomic
15:15 Practical Architecture Work at Telenor by Jan Øyvind
Aagedal
16:15 Group exercise is cancelled, send email if help needed
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(Multi) Agent Software Technologies
Ismar Slomic
SINTEF ICT
21. April 08
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The Adequacy Hypothesis
Agent-oriented approaches can significantly enhance
our ability to model, design and build complex
(distributed) software systems
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What is an Agent?
“encapsulated computer system, situated in some environment,
and capable of flexible autonomous action in that environment
in order to meet its design objectives” (Wooldridge)
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Example: BigDog – might be
implemented by agent(s)
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What is an Agent?
“encapsulated computer system, situated in some
environment, and capable of flexible autonomous
action in that environment in order to meet its
design objectives” (Wooldridge)
• control over internal state and over own behaviour
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From Objects to Agents
autonomous
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What is an Agent?
“encapsulated computer system, situated in some
environment, and capable of flexible autonomous
action in that environment in order to meet its
design objectives” (Wooldridge)
• control over internal state and over own behavior
• experiences environment through sensors and acts
through effectors
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From Objects to Agents
autonomous
interacting
Object Request Broker
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What is an Agent?
“encapsulated computer system, situated in some
environment, and capable of flexible autonomous
action in that environment in order to meet its
design objectives” (Wooldridge)
• control over internal state and over own behavior
• experiences environment through sensors and acts
through effectors
• reactive: respond in timely fashion to environmental
change
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From Objects to Agents
autonomous
interacting
reactive
Object Request Broker
ICT
What is an Agent?
“encapsulated computer system, situated in some
environment, and capable of flexible autonomous
action in that environment in order to meet its
design objectives” (Wooldridge)
• control over internal state and over own behavior
• experiences environment through sensors and acts
through effectors
• reactive: respond in timely fashion to environmental
change
• proactive: act in anticipation of future goals
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From Objects to Agents
autonomous
interacting
reactive
pro-active
Object Request Broker
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What is an Agent?
Weak Notion
of Agency
Stronger Notion
of Agency
Other
Properties
Autonomy
Knowledge/Beliefs
Rational
Social Ability
Intentions
Truthful
Desires/Goals
Benevolent
Reactivity
Pro-Activeness
Obligations
Mobile
Capabilities
Emotional
Because the concept of goals is frequently adopted in a
business context as well as in service-oriented architectures, it
is clear that we need to deal with the strong notion of agency.
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Platform independent model for
multi-agents (PIM4MAS)
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Agent aspect
Agent has access to a set of Resources from its surrounding environment. It can
perform particular Roles and Behaviors
Agent may have certain Capabilities that represent the set of Behaviors the
Agent can possess
Agent could be member in an Organization that represents the social structure
agents can take part in
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Organization aspect
Organization is a special kind of Cooperation
Therefore the Organization can perform Roles and have Capabilities which can
be performed by its members, be it agents or suborganizations
Multiple inheritance of the Organization, from the Agent and the Cooperation,
also allows it to have its own internal Protocol that specifies how the
Organization coordinates its members
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Behavioural aspect
Behavior refers to a set of Flows that could be either of the type InformationFlow
or ControlFlow
Behaviour contains a set of Steps (i.e. StructuredSteps and Tasks) that are
linked to each other via a Flow.
Plans could either be composed by more complex control structures (i.e. Scope)
or by simple atomic activities (i.e. Task)
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Role aspect
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Interaction aspect
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PIM to PSM
PIM4MAS
JACK
Metamodel
JADE
metamodel
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References
http://www.bostondynamics.com/content/sec.php?section=BigDog
(BigDog)
http://www.sei.cmu.edu/str/descriptions/orb.html (ORB)
http://www.agent-software.com/ (JACK)
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