From the Publisher:
An agent is an entity with domain knowledge, goals and actions. Multi-agent systems are a set of agents which
interact in a common environment. Multi-agent systems deal with the construction of complex systems involving multiple agents and their coordination. A multi-agent system (MAS) is a distributed computing system with
autonomous interacting intelligent agents that coordinate their actions so as to achieve its goal(s) jointly or competitively.

Introduction to Multiagent Systems

We propose cognitive packet networks (CPN) in which intelligent capabilities for routing and flow control are concentrated in the packets, rather than in the nodes and protocols. Cognitive packets within a CPN route themselves. They are assigned goals before entering the network and pursue these goals adaptively. Cognitive packets learn from their own observations about the network and from the experience of other packets with whom they exchange information via mailboxes. Cognitive packets rely minimally on routers. This paper describes CPN and shows how learning can support intelligent behavior of cognitive packets.

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Cognitive packet networks

FIPA-OS (FIPA Open Source) is an open agent platform originating from Nortel Networks. The platform supports communication between multiple agents using an agent communication language which conforms to the FIPA (Foundation for Intelligent Physical Agents) agent standards. A key focus of the platform is that it supports openness. This is naturally supported by the agent paradigm itself and by the design of the platform itself whose parts have loose coupling such that extensions and innovations to support agent communication can occur in several key areas. The openness is further emphasized in that the platform software is distributed and managed under an open-source licensing scheme. FIPA-OS is being deployed in several domains including virtual private network provisioning, distributed meeting scheduling and a virtual home environment. It has been demonstrated to interoperate with other heterogeneous FIPA compliant platforms and is in use in numerous institutions around the world.

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The FIPA-OS agent platform: Open Source for Open Standards

D'Agents is a general-purpose mobile-agent system that has been used in several information-retrieval applications. In this paper, we first examine one such application, operational support for military field personnel, where D'Agents greatly simplifies the task of providing efficient, application-specific access to remote information resources. After describing the application, we discuss the key differences between D'Agents and most other mobile-agent systems, notably its support for strong mobility and multiple agent languages. Finally, we derive a small, simple application that is representative of many information-retrieval tasks, including those in the example application, and use this application to compare the scalability of mobile agents and traditional client/server approaches. The results confirm and quantify the usefulness of mobile code, and perhaps more importantly, confirm that intuition about when to use mobile code is usually correct. Although significant additional experiments are required to fully characterize the complex mobile-agent performance space, the results presented here help to answer the basic question of when mobile agents should be considered at all, particularly for information-retrieval applications.

D'Agents: applications and performance of a mobile-agent system

This paper describes the design of a prototype integrated mobile telemedicine system that is compatible with existing mobile telecommunications networks and upgradable for use with third-generation networks. The system, when fully developed, will enable a doctor to monitor remotely a patient who is free to move around for sports medicine and for emergency situations.

Design of a telemedicine system using a mobile telephone

The emerging notion of active networks describes the general vision of communication network evolution, where the network nodes become active because they take part in the computation of applications and provision of customized services. In this context mobile agent technology and programmable switches are considered as enabling technologies. This article looks at the impact of mobile agent technology on telecommunication service environments, influenced by the intelligent network (IN) architecture. The authors illustrate how the integration of mobile agent platforms into IN elements, notably into the IN switches, will realize an active IN environment. This enables telecom services implemented through mobile service agents on a per user basis to be instantly deployed at programmable switching nodes, which results in better performance and fault tolerance compared to traditional IN service implementations.

Mobile agents - enabling technology for active intelligent network implementation

The development of third-generation mobile communication systems, such as UMTS, should be based on state-of-the-art middleware technologies. Today distributed object technology (DOT), such as OMG's CORBA, has gained considerable acceptance in the telecommunications environment, within the evolution of IN, TMN systems, and also in the context of UMTS design. Another new software technology, mobile agent technology (MAT), is gaining momentum in the field of telecommunications, too. In view of emerging agent standards (such as the OMG work on MASIF) which consider mobile agent technology as an important enhancement of DOT, studies on the impact of MAT on telecommunications systems (such as IN and TMN) are underway. This article discusses the potentialities of the use of emerging standard mobile agent platforms in the context of third-generation mobile communication systems, such as UMTS.

Impacts of mobile agent technology on mobile communication system evolution

Today, distributed object technology (DOT), particularly the Object Management Group’s (OMG) Common Object Request Broker Architecture (CORBA) (Object Management Group, 1995), is considered as an enabling technology for the evolution of telecommunications environments, e.g. in telecommunications management and Intelligent Networks (see work undertaken in the OMG Telecom Domain Task Force [URL 13]). In addition, mobile agent technology (MAT) is currently gaining momentum in the telecommunications domain (S. Krause, T. Magedanz, K. Rothermel, 1996). Up to now, various mobile agent platforms have been developed in academia and industry, based on different programming languages and middleware, but not necessarily on DOT.

M. Breugst

Papers

Mobile agents - enabling technology for active intelligent network implementation

Impacts of mobile agent technology on mobile communication system evolution

Grasshopper — An Agent Platform for Mobile Agent-Based Services in Fixed and Mobile Telecommunications Environments