Skip to main content

Enabling the Reuse of Platform-Dependent Agents in Heterogeneous Agent-Based Applications

  • Conference paper
Languages, Methodologies and Development Tools for Multi-Agent Systems (LADS 2007)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNAI,volume 5118))

  • 333 Accesses

Abstract

There is an increasing interest in the development of applications which involve agents operating on (mobile) agent-based platforms of different types (heterogeneous agent-based applications). In this context, a relevant and emerging issue concerns the possibility of integrating platform dependent agents (i.e. agents which were specifically developed for a particular agent platform) in these applications. This issue becomes particularly important in the development of inter-organization agent-based applications where different organizations, which usually adopt different agent platforms and related applications for offering their services, may attempt to join to constitute a new (virtual) organization or, simply, to jointly offer new services to users. This paper presents a solution for enabling the reuse of platform-dependent agents in heterogeneous agent-based applications. The proposed solution is a natural enhancement of JIMAF and makes it the only full-fledged interoperability approach which, without requiring any modification to the platforms made interoperable, fully addresses the main interoperability issues of migration, execution, and communication among heterogeneous mobile agent platforms and also provides platform-dependent agent-based code reuse.

This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.

Access this chapter

Chapter
USD 29.95
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
eBook
USD 39.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Available as PDF
  • Read on any device
  • Instant download
  • Own it forever
Softcover Book
USD 54.99
Price excludes VAT (USA)
  • Compact, lightweight edition
  • Dispatched in 3 to 5 business days
  • Free shipping worldwide - see info

Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout

Purchases are for personal use only

Institutional subscriptions

Preview

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.

References

  1. Aglets mobile agent system, documentation and software (2002), http://aglets.sourceforge.net/

  2. Ajanta mobile agent system, documentation and software (2003), http://www.cs.umn.edu/Ajanta/

  3. Artail, H., Kahale, E.: MAWS:A platform-independent framework for mobile agents using Web services. Journal of Parallel and Distributed Computing 66, 428–443 (2006)

    Article  MATH  Google Scholar 

  4. Bellavista, P., Corradi, A., Stefanelli, C.: Corba solutions for interoperability in mobile agent environments. In: Proceedings of the 2nd International Symposium on Distributed Objects and Applications (DAO 2000), Antwerp, The Netherlands, September 21-23, 2000, pp. 283–292 (2000)

    Google Scholar 

  5. Bellifemine, F., Caire, G., Poggi, A., Rimassa, G.: JADE, a white paper. J. Exp. in search of innovation 3(3), 6–19 (2003)

    Google Scholar 

  6. Braun, P., Trinh, D., Kowalczyk, R.: Integrating a New Mobility Service into the Jade Agent Toolkit. In: Karmouch, A., Pierre, S. (eds.) MATA 2005. LNCS, vol. 3744, pp. 354–363. Springer, Heidelberg (2005)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  7. Cybele Agent Infrastucture, documentation and software (2007), http://www.opencybele.org

  8. FIPAOS Agent Platform, documentation and software (2003), http://sourceforge.net/projects/fipa-os/

  9. Fortino, G., Garro, A., Russo, W.: Achieving Mobile Agent System interoperability through software layering. In: Information and Software Technology, pp. 322–341. Elsevier B.V., Amsterdam (2008)

    Google Scholar 

  10. Fortino, G., Garro, A., Russo, W.: Enhancing JADE Interoperability through the Java-based Interoperable Mobile Agent Framework. In: Proceedings of the 5th IEEE International Conference on Industrial Informatics (INDIN); Special session on Agent Theories and Practice for Industry (ATPI), Vienna, Austria (July 2007)

    Google Scholar 

  11. Foundation of Intelligent and Physical Agents, documentation and specifications (2007), http://www.fipa.org

  12. Giampapa, J.A., Paolucci, M., Sycara, K.: Agent interoperation across multiagent system boundaries. In: Proceedings of the 4th International Conference on Autonomous Agents, pp. 179–186. ACM Press, New York (2000)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  13. Grasshopper mobile agent system, IKV++ GmbH, documentation and software (2003), http://www.grasshopper.de/

  14. Grimstrup, A., Gray, R., Kotz, D., Breedy, M., Carvalho, M., Cowin, T., Chacon, D., Barton, J., Garret, C., Hofmann, M.: Toward Interoperability of Mobile-Agent Systems. In: Suri, N. (ed.) MA 2002. LNCS, vol. 2535, pp. 106–120. Springer, Heidelberg (2002)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  15. Hasegawa, T., Cho, K., Kumeno, F., Nakajima, S., Ohsuga, A., Honiden, S.: Interoperability for mobile agents by incarnation agents. In: Proceedings of the 2nd Int. Joint Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems, pp. 1006–1007. ACM Press, New York (2003)

    Chapter  Google Scholar 

  16. JACK Agent Platform, documentation and software (2007), http://www.agent-software.com/shared/products/index.html

  17. JADE, Java Agent DEvelopment framework, documentation and software (2007), http://jade.tilab.com

  18. JIMAF (Java-based Interoperable Mobile Agent Framework), documentation and software (2006), http://lisdip.deis.unical.it/software/jimaf/

  19. Lakos, J.: Large Scale C++ Software Design. Addison-Wesley, Reading (1996)

    Google Scholar 

  20. Luck, M., McBurney, P., Preist, C.: A Manifesto for Agent Technology: Towards Next Generation Computing. Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems 9(3), 203–252 (2004)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  21. Magnin, L., Pham, V.T., Dury, A., Besson, N., Thiefaine, A.: Our Guest Agents are Welcome to Your Agent Platforms. In: Proceedings of the Symposium on Applied Computing (SAC 2002), Madrid, Spain, March 10-13, pp.107–114 (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  22. MASIF (Mobile Agent System Interoperability Facility) specification, OMG TC Document orbos/98-03-09 (1998), ftp://ftp.omg.org/pub/docs/orbos/98-03-09.pdf

  23. Misikangas, P., Raatikainen, K.: Agent migration between incompatible agent platforms. In: Proceedings of the 20th Int’l Conference on Distributed Computer Systems, Taipei, Taiwan, April 10-13, 2000, pp. 4–10. IEEE Computer Society Press, Los Alamitos (2000)

    Google Scholar 

  24. Objectspace Voyager, documentation and software (2003), http://www.recursionsw.com/products/voyager

  25. Payne, T., Paolucci, M., Singh, R., Sycara, K.: Facilitating Message Exchange though Middle Agents. In: Proceedings of the 1st Int. Joint Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems. ACM Press, New York (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  26. Payne, T., Singh, R., Sycara, K.: Communicating agents in open multi-agent systems. In: Proceedings of the 1st GSFC/JPL Workshop on Radical Agent Concepts (WRAC), McLean, VA, USA (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  27. Picco, G.: Mobile Agents: An Introduction. Journal of Microprocessors and Microsystems 25(2), 65–74 (2001)

    Article  Google Scholar 

  28. Pinsdorf, U., Roth, V.: Mobile Agent Interoperability Patterns and Practice. In: Proceedings of 9th Annual IEEE Int’l Conference and Workshop on the Engineering of Computer-Based Systems (ECBS), Lund, Sweden, April 8-12, pp. 238–244 (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  29. Purvis, M.K., Cranefield, S., Nowostawski, M., Ward, R., Carter, D., Oliveira, M.A.: Agentcities interaction using the opal platform. In: Proceedings of the Workshop on Challenges in Open Agent Systems, 1st Int. Joint Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems. ACM Press, New York (2002)

    Google Scholar 

  30. Tjung, D., Tsukamoto, M., Nishio, S.: A Converter Approach for Mobile Agent Systems Integration: A Case of Aglets to Voyager. In: Proceedings of the 1st Int. Workshop on Mobile Agents for Telecommunication Applications (MATA 1999), Ottawa, Canada, October 6-8, pp. 179–195 (1999)

    Google Scholar 

Download references

Author information

Authors and Affiliations

Authors

Editor information

Mehdi Dastani Amal El Fallah Seghrouchni João Leite Paolo Torroni

Rights and permissions

Reprints and permissions

Copyright information

© 2008 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg

About this paper

Cite this paper

Fortino, G., Garro, A., Russo, W. (2008). Enabling the Reuse of Platform-Dependent Agents in Heterogeneous Agent-Based Applications. In: Dastani, M., El Fallah Seghrouchni, A., Leite, J., Torroni, P. (eds) Languages, Methodologies and Development Tools for Multi-Agent Systems. LADS 2007. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 5118. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-85058-8_13

Download citation

  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-85058-8_13

  • Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-540-85057-1

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-540-85058-8

  • eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)

Publish with us

Policies and ethics