Abstract
The fast pace of evolution in Agent-oriented Software Engineering leads to a great variety of continuously changing Multi-Agent System (MAS) Modeling Languages (MLs). In this situation, there is a rising need of evaluation for MAS MLs, as the plenty of works on this subject reflects. This paper follows this line of research presenting an evaluation framework to measure quantitatively MAS MLs. The framework includes metrics about availability, specificity, and expressiveness of the MLs. Otherwise than existing frameworks, this work considers metamodels to define its measures and focuses on the quantitative measurement instead of qualitative evaluations. With these metrics and the data gathered from existing MLs, the goal is to quantify the appropriateness of a given MAS ML for a particular problem domain. In addition, these metrics can quantitatively track the improvements of MAS MLs on these features. The paper also presents the results of the current experiments with the framework that have taken measures in nine problem domains with six MAS MLs.
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Similar content being viewed by others
References
INGENIAS Development Kit. (March 6, 2008), http://ingenias.sourceforge.net/
Bauer, B., Müller, J.P., Odell, J.J.: Agent UML: A Formalism for Specifying Multiagent Software Systems. In: Ciancarini, P., Wooldridge, M.J. (eds.) AOSE 2000. LNCS, vol. 1957, pp. 91–103. Springer, Heidelberg (2001)
Bresciani, P., Perini, A., Giorgini, P., Giunchiglia, F., Mylopoulos, J.: Tropos: An Agent-Oriented Software Development Methodology. Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems 8(3), 203–236 (2004)
Chella, A., Cossentino, M., Sabatucci, L., Seidita, V.: Agile PASSI: An Agile Process for Designing Agents. International Journal of Computer Systems Science & Engineering. Special issue on Software Engineering for Multi-Agent Systems (May 2006)
Dam, K.H., Winikoff, M.: Comparing Agent-Oriented Methodologies. In: Giorgini, P., Henderson-Sellers, B., Winikoff, M. (eds.) AOIS 2003. LNCS, vol. 3030, pp. 78–93. Springer, Heidelberg (2004)
Darley, V., Sanders, D.: An agent-based model of a corrugated-box factory: the trade-off between finished goods stock and on-time-in-full delivery. In: Proceedings of the Fifth Workshop on Agent-Based Simulation (2004)
DeLoach, S., Wood, M.F., Sparkman, C.H.: Multiagent Systems Engineering. International Journal of Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering 11(3), 231–258 (2001)
DeLoach, S.A.: Multiagent systems engineering of organization-based multiagent systems. ACM SIGSOFT Software Engineering Notes 30(4), 1–7 (2005)
Fuentes-Fernández, R., Gómez-Sanz, J.J., Pavón, J.: Model integration in agent-oriented development. International Journal of Agent-Oriented Software Engineering 1(1), 2–27 (2007)
García-Magariño, I., Pérez Agüera, J.R., Gómez-Sanz, J.J.: Reaching Consensus in a Multi-agent System. In: 6th International Workshop on Practical Applications on Agents and Multi-agent Systems, IWPAAMS 2007, Salamanca, Spain, November 12-13, pp. 349–358 (2007)
OMG (Object Management Group). UML, Unified Modeling Language Infrastructure, Version 2.0 (2005) (Retrieved July 30, 2008), http://www.omg.org/spec/UML
Jacobi, S., Madrigal-Mora, C., León-Soto, E., Fischer, K.: AgentSteel: an agent-based online system for the planning and observation of steel production. In: Proceedings of the fourth international joint conference on Autonomous agents and multiagent systems, pp. 114–119 (2005)
Kargl, H., Strommer, M., Wimmer, M.: Measuring the Explicitness of Modeling Concepts in Metamodels. In: ACM/IEEE 9th International Conference on Model Driven Engineering Languages and Systems (MoDELS/UML 2006), Workshop on Model Size Metrics, Genova, Italy (October 2006)
Kingston, J., Macintosh, A.: Knowledge management through multi-perspective modelling: representing and distributing organizational memory. Knowledge-Based Systems 13(2-3), 121–131 (2000)
Mao, X., ter Mors, A., Roos, N., Witteveen, C.: Agent-based scheduling for aircraft deicing. In: Proceedings of 18th Belgium-Netherlands Conference on Artificial Intelligence, BNAIC 2006, Namur, Belgium (2006)
Mulyar, N., van der Aalst, W.M.P., Peleg, M.: A Pattern-based Analysis of Clinical Computer-interpretable Guideline Modeling Languages. Journal of the American Medical Informatics Association 14(6), 781 (2007)
Oomes, A.: Organization awareness in crisis management. In: Proc. ISCRAM 2004, pp. 63–68 (2004)
Opdahl, A.L., Henderson-Sellers, B.: Grounding the OML metamodel in ontology. The Journal of Systems & Software 57(2), 119–143 (2001)
Opdahl, A.L., Henderson-Sellers, B.: Ontological Evaluation of the UML Using the Bunge–Wand–Weber Model. Software and Systems Modeling 1(1), 43–67 (2002)
Padgham, L., Winikoff, M.: Prometheus: A Methodology for Developing Intelligent Agents. In: Proceedings of the Third International Workshop on Agent Oriented Software Engineering, at AAMAS (2002)
Pavón, J., Gómez-Sanz, J.: Agent Oriented Software Engineering with INGENIAS. In: Mařík, V., Müller, J.P., Pěchouček, M. (eds.) CEEMAS 2003. LNCS, vol. 2691, pp. 394–403. Springer, Heidelberg (2003)
Schraagen, J., Eikelboom, A., te Brake, G.: Experimental evaluation of a critical thinking tool to support decision making in crisis situations. In: Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Information Systems for Crisis Response and Management, Brussels, Belgium, April 18-20 (2005)
Shehory, O., Sturm, A.: Evaluation of modeling techniques for agent-based systems. In: Proceedings of the fifth international conference on Autonomous agents, pp. 624–631 (2001)
Skobelev, P., Glaschenko, A., Grachev, I., Inozemtsev, S.: MAGENTA technology case studies of magenta i-scheduler for road transportation. In: Proceedings of the 6th international joint conference on Autonomous agents and multiagent systems (2007)
Sturm, A., Shehory, O.: A Framework for Evaluating Agent-Oriented Methodologies. In: Giorgini, P., Henderson-Sellers, B., Winikoff, M. (eds.) AOIS 2003. LNCS, vol. 3030, pp. 94–109. Springer, Heidelberg (2004)
Sudeikat, J., Braubach, L., Pokahr, A., Lamersdorf, W.: Evaluation of Agent-Oriented Software Methodologies-Examination of the Gap Between Modeling and Platform. In: Odell, J.J., Giorgini, P., Müller, J.P. (eds.) AOSE 2004. LNCS, vol. 3382, pp. 126–141. Springer, Heidelberg (2005)
Susi, A., Perini, A., Mylopoulos, J.: The Tropos Metamodel and its Use. Informatica 29(4), 401–408 (2005)
Tran, Q.N.N., Low, G., Williams, M.A., Wales, N.S., Mary, A.: A Preliminary Comparative Feature Analysis of Multi-agent Systems Development Methodologies. In: Bresciani, P., Giorgini, P., Henderson-Sellers, B., Low, G., Winikoff, M. (eds.) AOIS 2004. LNCS, vol. 3508, pp. 157–168. Springer, Heidelberg (2005)
Vépa, É., Bézivin, J., Brunelière, H., Jouault, F.: Measuring Model Repositories. In: Proceedings of the Model Size Metrics Workshop at the MoDELS/UML 2006 conference, Genova, Italy (2006)
Yang, A., Abbass, H.A., Sarker, R.: Landscape dynamics in multi-agent simulation combat systems. In: Webb, G.I., Yu, X. (eds.) AI 2004. LNCS, vol. 3339, pp. 39–50. Springer, Heidelberg (2004)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2009 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
García-Magariño, I., Gómez-Sanz, J.J., Fuentes-Fernández, R. (2009). An Evaluation Framework for MAS Modeling Languages Based on Metamodel Metrics. In: Luck, M., Gomez-Sanz, J.J. (eds) Agent-Oriented Software Engineering IX. AOSE 2008. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 5386. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-01338-6_8
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-01338-6_8
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-642-01337-9
Online ISBN: 978-3-642-01338-6
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)