Agent-Oriented Information Systems II: 6th International Bi-Conference Workshop, AOIS 2004, Riga, Latvia, June 8, 2004 and New York, NY, USA, July 20, v. 2

This book constitutes the thoroughly refereed post-proceedings of the 6th International Bi-Conference Workshop on Agent-Oriented Information Systems, AOIS 2004, held in Riga, Latvia in June and in New York, NY, USA in July 2004. The 15 revised full papers presented have gone through two rounds of reviewing and improvement and were selected from an initial total of 36 submissions. The papers are organized in topical sections on information systems, analysis and modeling, methodologies, and applications. Front matter......Page 1 Introduction......Page 10 The Management Model......Page 11 The System Architecture......Page 12 Support Techniques......Page 14 The Major Components......Page 16 An Application - A Research Project Management System......Page 21 Project Modelling......Page 22 Project Enactment......Page 23 Browse Project......Page 24 The Result Analysis......Page 25 Conclusion and Future Work......Page 26 References......Page 27 Introduction......Page 28 Application Example: Web Information Search System......Page 29 Challenges Pertaining to UIS......Page 30 Overview......Page 32 The User Interface Agent Copes with Situations......Page 34 Actualization of the Service by the Service Mediation Agent......Page 35 Coping with Changes by Means of Inter-agent Communications......Page 36 Implementation of the Framework......Page 37 Implementation of a Web Information Search System......Page 38 Evaluation of the Framework......Page 39 Functional Comparison with Conventional Methods......Page 41 Related Work......Page 42 Conclusions......Page 43 Introduction......Page 45 Conclusion and FutureWork......Page 58 An Extended Set of GPGP Coordination Mechanisms......Page 47 EMS Model......Page 50 Framework......Page 51 Input Factors......Page 53 Output Evaluations......Page 54 Quantitative Results......Page 55 Analytic Results—Mechanisms and Domain Task Situations......Page 56 References......Page 60 Introduction......Page 61 The Quality Classification Problem for Market-Based Recommendations......Page 63 The Q-Learning Algorithm......Page 65 The Exploration Strategy......Page 66 The Overall Strategy......Page 67 Evaluation Metrics......Page 68 Experimental Settings......Page 69 Learning Strategy Effectiveness......Page 70 Related Work......Page 73 Conclusions and Future Work......Page 75 Introduction......Page 77 The Architecture of the SNet Tool......Page 78 The Entrepreneurship Domain......Page 79 Mapping the i* Model to a ConGolog Program......Page 81 From Limits Towards New Challenges......Page 82 Modelling Roles Instead of Individual Agents......Page 83 A General Monitoring Framework......Page 85 Monitoring in SNet......Page 86 Meta Agent Development (MAD)......Page 89 Conclusion......Page 91 Untitled......Page 80 Introduction......Page 94 Commitment Operations......Page 95 Commitment Causality......Page 96 Representing Multiparty Agreement Using Commitments......Page 97 Derivation Rules......Page 98 Building Satisfiable Agreements......Page 99 Resolving Agreement Deadlocks......Page 100 Discussion......Page 103 Introduction......Page 106 Business Facts and Rules......Page 107 Object-Role Modelling......Page 109 What Does Agent-Orientation Add to the Modelling Task?......Page 112 ORM and DEMO......Page 113 ORM and AOR......Page 115 References......Page 117 Introduction......Page 119 Things, Sets, Entities, Individuals and Types......Page 121 Different Kinds of Types......Page 123 Different Kinds of Individuals......Page 125 An Application of UFO-A 0.2 to Agent-Oriented Modelling......Page 127 UFO-B 0.2 – Perdurants......Page 128 UFO-C 0.2 – Intentional, Social and Linguistic Things......Page 129 References......Page 131 Introduction......Page 134 Background......Page 135 AgentZ......Page 137 Working Example: A Supermarket......Page 143 Conclusions and Future Work......Page 146 References......Page 147 Introduction......Page 149 Method Engineering......Page 150 The OPEN Process Framework......Page 151 Method Fragments in the Repository......Page 152 Tasks Characterizing Prometheus......Page 153 Techniques Recommended by Prometheus......Page 154 Work Products Advocated by Prometheus......Page 155 Existing Support and Mappings Between OPF and Prometheus......Page 158 New Tasks......Page 160 New Work Products......Page 161 References......Page 163 Introduction......Page 166 Feature Analysis Framework......Page 167 MAS Development Methodologies......Page 169 Comparative Analysis......Page 170 References......Page 176 Introduction......Page 178 The CMRadar Agent......Page 179 Template Data Format......Page 181 Manager......Page 182 Scheduler......Page 184 Experimental Setup......Page 186 Evaluating Strategies......Page 187 Conclusion......Page 189 Introduction......Page 191 AF-APL......Page 192 The Run-Time Environment......Page 193 The Development Environment......Page 194 EasiShop......Page 195 The EasiShop Scenario......Page 196 Implementation......Page 197 Agents @ Work in EasiShop......Page 198 Genie Services......Page 199 Genie Architecture......Page 200 Agents @ Work in Gulliver's Genie......Page 202 References......Page 204 Introduction......Page 207 References......Page 219 The Trading Agent Competition MAS – A Case Study......Page 208 Introducing Learning Techniques in Multi-agent Systems......Page 209 Systemic Goal and Performance Measure Selection......Page 211 Machine Learning Design......Page 212 Implementation, Training, Testing and Evaluation......Page 214 Final Comments......Page 218 Introduction......Page 221 Approach......Page 226 Agent Systems......Page 222 Communication Problems in an Architecture Company......Page 223 Filtering Agents......Page 227 Distribution Agents......Page 229 Scenario......Page 230 Conclusions......Page 233 References......Page 234 Back matter......Page 236 An Agent-based Collaborative Emergent Process Management System / Aizhong Ling, Igor Hawryszkiewycz, Brian Henderson-sellers -- Mobeet : A Multi-agent Framework For Ubiquitous Information Systems / Nobukazu Yoshioka, Akihiko Ohsuga, Shinichi Honiden -- The Analysis Of Coordination In An Information System Application : Emergency Medical Services / Wei Chen, Keith S. Decker -- Market-based Recommender Systems : Learning Users' Interests By Quality Classification / Yan Zheng Wei, Luc Moreau, Nicholas R. Jennings -- Snet Reloaded : Roles, Monitoring And Agent Evolution / Günter Gans [and Others] -- Analyzing Multiparty Agreements With Commitments / Feng Wan, Munindar P. Singh -- Fact-orientation Meets Agent-orientation / Terry Halpin -- Towards Ontological Foundations For Agent Modelling Concepts Using The Unified Fundational Ontology (ufo) / Giancarlo Guizzardi, Gerd Wagner -- Agentz : Extending Object-z For Multi-agent Systems Specification / Anarosa A.f. Brandão, Paulo Alencar, Carlos J.p. De Lucena -- Incorporating Elements From The Prometheus Agent-oriented Methodology In Hte Open Process Framework / Brian Henderson-sellers, Quynh-nhu N. Tran, J. Debenhan -- A Priliminary Comparative Feature Ananlysis Of Multi-agent Systems Development Methodologies / Quynh-nhu N. Tran, Graham Low, Mary-anne Williams -- Cmradar : A Personal Assistant Agent For Calendar Management / Pragnesh Jay Modi [and Others] -- Agents As Catalysts For Mobile Computing / Gregory M.p. O'hare [and Others] -- A Systematic Approach For Including Machine Learning Multi-agent Systems / José A.r.p. Sardinha [and Others] -- Agents To Foster Conscious Design And Reuse In Architecture / Daniel Pinho [and Others]. Paolo Bresciani ... [et Al.] (eds.). Includes Bibliographical References And Index. Also Issued Online. Information systems have become the backbone of all kinds of organizations - day. In almost every sector - manufacturing, education, health care, government and businesses large and small - information systems are relied upon for - eryday work, communication, information gathering and decision-making. Yet, the in?exibilities in current technologies and methods have also resulted in poor performance, incompatibilities and obstacles to change. As many organizations are reinventing themselves to meet the challenges of global competition and e-commerce, there is increasing pressure to develop and deploy new technologies that are ?exible, robust and responsive to rapid and unexpected change. Agent concepts hold great promise for responding to the new realities of - formation systems. They o?er higher-level abstractions and mechanisms which address issues such as knowledge representation and reasoning, communication, coordination, cooperation among heterogeneous and autonomous parties, p- ception, commitments, goals, beliefs, intentions, etc., all of which need conc- tual modelling. On the one hand, the concrete implementation of these concepts can lead to advanced functionalities, e.g., in inference-based query answering, transaction control, adaptive work ?ows, brokering and integration of disparate information sources, and automated communication processes. On the other hand, their rich representational capabilities allow for more faithful and ?- ible treatments of complex organizational processes, leading to more e?ective requirements analysis and architectural/detailed design An emergent process is a process whose goal and activities to achieve that goal are unable to be specified in advance but emerge over time as knowledge gained from the activities performed earlier shapes the subsequent goal and activities.