Abstract
This paper describes how multiple interacting swarms of adaptive mobile agents can be used to locate faults in networks. The paper proposes the use of distributed problem solving using mobile agents for fault finding in order to address the issues of client/server approaches to network management and control, such as scalability and the difficulties associated with maintaining an accurate view of the network. The paper uses a recently described architectural description for an agent that is biologically inspired and proposes chemical interaction as the principal mechanism for inter-swarm communication. Agents have behavior that is inspired by the foraging activities of ants, with each agent capable of simple actions; global knowledge is not assumed. The creation of chemical trails is proposed as the primary mechanism used in distributed problem solving arising from the self-organization of swarms of agents. Fault location is achieved as a consequence of agents moving through the network, sensing, acting upon sensed information, and subsequently modifying the chemical environment that they inhabit. Elements of a mobile code framework that is being used to support this research, and the mechanisms used for agent mobility within the network environment, are described.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Case, J. D., Fedor, M., Schoffstall, M. L. and Davin, C., Simple Network Management Protocol, RFC 1157, May 1990.
Yemini, Y., The OSI Network Management Model, IEEE Communication Magazine, pages 20–29, May 1993.
Yemini, Y., Goldszmidt, G. and Yemini, S., Network Management by Delegation. In The Second International Symposium on Integrated Network Management, Washington, DC, April 1991.
Case, J.D., and Levi, D. B., SNMP Mid-Level-Manager MIB, Draft, IETF, 1993.
Kotay, K. and Kotz, D., Transportable Agents. In Yannis Labrou and Tim Finin, editors, Proceedings of the CIKM Workshop on Intelligent Information Agents, Third International Conference on Information and Knowledge Management (CIKM 94), Gaithersburg, Maryland, December 1994.
Beckers R., Deneuborg J.L. and Goss S., Trails and U-turns in the Selection of a Path of the Ant Lasius Niger. In J. theor. Biol. Vol. 159, pp. 397–415.
Susilo, G., Bieszczad, A. and Pagurek, B., Infrastructure for Advanced Network Management based on Mobile Code, Proceedings IEEE/IFIP Network Operations and Management Symposium NOMS '98, New Orleans, Luisiana, February 1998.
Bieszczad, A. and Pagurek, B., Network Management Application-Oriented Taxonomy of Mobile Code, to be presented at the IEEE/IFIP Network Operations and Management Symposium NOMS'98, New Orleans, Louisiana, February 1998.
OMG, Mobile Agent Facility Specification, OMG TC cf/xx-x-xx, 2 June 1997.
Beni G., and Wang J., Swarm Intelligence in Cellular Robotic Systems, Proceedings of the NATO Advanced Workshop on Robots and Biological Systems, II Ciocco, Tuscany, Italy.
Grassé P.P., La reconstruction du nid et les coordinations inter-individuelles chez Bellicoitermes natalenis et Cubitermes sp. La theorie de la stigmergie: Essai d'interpretation des termites constructeurs. In Insect Societies, Vol. 6, pp. 41–83.
Dorigo M., V. Maniezzo and A. Colorni, The Ant System: An Autocatalytic Optimizing Process. Technical Report No. 91-016, Politecnico di Milano, Italy.
White T., Routing and Swarm Intelligence, Technical Report SCE-97-15, Systems and Computer Engineering, Carleton University, September 1997.
Schoonderwoerd R., O. Holland and J. Bruten, Ant-like Agents for Load Balancing in Telecommunications Networks. Proceedings of Agents '97, Marina del Rey, CA, ACM Press pp. 209–216, 1997.
Di Caro G. and Dorigo M., AntNet: A Mobile Agents Approach to Adaptive Routing. Tech. Rep. IRIDIA/97-12, Université Libre de Bruxelles, Belgium, 1997.
Pagurek B., Li Y., Bieszczad A., and Susilo G., Configuration Management In Heterogeneous ATM Environments using Mobile Agents, Proceedings of the Second International Workshop on Intelligent Agents in Telecommunications Applications (IATA '98).
Goldberg, D., Genetic Algorithms in Search, Optimization, and Machine Learning. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley, 1989.
Holland, J. H., Escaping Brittleness: the Possibilities of General-Purpose Learning Algorithms applied to Parallel Rule-Based Systems. In Machine Learning, an Artificial Intelligence Approach, Volume II, edited by R.S. Michalski, J.G. Carbonell and T.M. Mitchell, Morgan Kaufmann, 1986.
White T., and Pagurek B., Towards Multi-Swarm Problem Solving in Networks, Proceedings of the 3rd International Conference on Multi-Agent Systems (ICMAS '98), July 1998.
Ishida, Y., Active Diagnosis by Immunity-Based Agent Approach, Proceedings of the Seventh International Workshop on Principles of Diagnosis (DX 96), Val-Morin, Canada, pp. 106–114, 1996.
White, T., and Bieszczad, A., The Expert Advisor: An Expert System for Real Time Network Monitoring, European Conference on Artificial Intelligence, Proceedings of the Workshop on Advances in Real Time Expert Systems Technology, August, 1992.
White T., and Ross, N., Fault Diagnosis and Network Entities in a Next Generation Network Management System, in Proceedings of EXPERSYS-96, Paris, France, pp. 517–522.
White T. and Ross N., An Architecture for an Alarm Correlation Engine, Object Technology 97, Oxford, 13–16 April, 1997.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 1998 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
White, T., Bieszczad, A., Pagurek, B. (1998). Distributed fault location in networks using mobile agents. In: Albayrak, S., Garijo, F.J. (eds) Intelligent Agents for Telecommunication Applications. IATA 1998. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 1437. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/BFb0053949
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/BFb0053949
Published:
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-64720-1
Online ISBN: 978-3-540-69102-0
eBook Packages: Springer Book Archive