Coordination Of Internet Agents

The Internet confronts IT researchers, system designers, and application developers with completely new challenges and, as a fascinating new computing paradigm, agent technology has recently attracted broad interest and strong hopes for shaping the future information society. This monograph-like anthology is the first systematic guide to models and enabling technologies for the coordination of intelligent agents on the Internet and respective applications.

Papers collected here, from a December 2001 workshop held at the University of Central Florida, examine topics related to process coordination and ubiquitous computing. Papers on coordination models discuss areas such as space-based coordination and open distributed systems, global virtual data stru

In the ten years since the first MAAMAW was held in 1989, at King's College, Cambridge, the field of Multi-Agent Systems (MAS) has flourished. It has attracted an increasing amount of theoretical and applied research. During this decade, important efforts have been made to establish the scientific and technical foundations of MAS. MAAMAW publications are testimony to the progress achieved in key areas such as agent modelling and reasoning, multi-agent interaction and communication, and multi-agent organisation and social structure. Research results have covered a wide range of inter-related topics in each area including agent architectures, reasoning models, logics, conflict resolution, negotiation, resource allocation, load balancing, learning; social behaviour and interaction, languages and protocols, interagent and agent-human communication, social models, agent roles, norms and social laws, and static and dynamic organisational structures. The feasibility and the viability of the proposed models and techniques have been demonstrated through MAS applications in heterogeneous domains including electronic commerce, co-operative work, telecommunications, social and biological systems, robotics, office and business automation, public administration, social simulations and banking. As the applicability of the technology became understood, the multi-agent paradigm has been progressively accepted by product managers and system developers, giving rise to a considerable amount of business expectation from industry. These expectations do not rest on the concept or metaphor of agent, but on the development of MAS useful in an industrial setting, with real-time systems presenting the biggest challenge.

The characteristics of software systems are undergoing dramatic changes. We are moving rapidly into the age of ubiquitous information services. Persistent computing systems are being embedded in everyday objects. They interact in an autonomouswaywith eachother to provideus with increasinglycomplexservices and functionalities that we can access at any time from anywhere. As a con- quence, not only do the numbers of components of software systems increase; there is also a strong qualitative impact. Software systems are increasingly made up of autonomous, proactive, networked components. These interact with each other in patterns and via mechanisms that can hardly be modeled in terms of classical models of interaction or service-oriented coordination. To some extent, future software systems will exhibit characteristics making them more res- blant of natural systems and societies than of mechanical systems and software architectures. This situation poses exciting challenges to computer scientists and software engineers. Already, software agents and multi-agent systems are recognized as both useful abstractions and e?ective technologies for the modeling and building of complex distributed applications. However, little is done with regard to e?- tive and methodic development of complex software systems in terms of mul- agent societies. An urgent need exists for novel approaches to software modeling and software engineering that enable the successful deployment of software s- tems made up ofa massive number ofautonomous components, and that allowus to control and predict their behaviour.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the 5th International Workshop on Cooperative Information Agents, CIA 2001, held in Modena, Italy, in September 2001. The 12 revised full papers presented together with 3 full papers and 2 abstracts reflecting invited contributions were carefully reviewed and selected for inclusion in the book. The papers are organized in topical sections on personal assistance: interaction and avatars, information search and recommendation, data warehousing and data mining, collaboration and coordination, and information agents for mobile and wireless environments.

This volume contains the proceedings of the CEAS/DragNet European Drag Reduction Conference 2000. The conference addressed the recent advances in all areas of drag reduction research, development, validation and demonstration including laminar flow technology, adaptive wing concepts, turbulent and induced drag reduction, separation control and supersonic flow aspects. This volume is of particular interest to engineers, scientists and students working in the aeronautics industry, research establishments or academia.

Papers collected here, from a December 2001 workshop held at the University of Central Florida, examine topics related to process coordination and ubiquitous computing. Papers on coordination models discuss areas such as space-based coordination and open distributed systems, global virtual data stru

This book proposes a novel approach to improve multi-provider interactions based on the coordination of autonomous and self-motivated software entities acting on behalf of distinct operators. In addition, a novel way of addressing resource allocation and pricing in a compact framework is made possible by the use of powerful resource abstraction techniques. The book is addressed to researchers in the area of agent technology, automated negotiation, distributed constraint satisfaction, and networking. Furthermore, it should be a valuable resource for both network and service providers