An Engineering Approach to Cooperating Agents for Distributed Information Systems

This paper presents a multi-agent model of a distributed information system, using what is described as an engineering approach to real world application environment. The objective is to define, using proven ideas in the industrial context, the agent-based behaviour of the distributed system, which must operate correctly and effectively in an error-prone environment. Issues such as stability, robustness and scalability have also been addressed, along with some new ideas on a high-level communication strategies, as distinct from protocol-based communications. The work is being carried out under the DREAM theme at Keele, an earlier version of the approach having been successfully applied to agent-based manufacturing in an international project called HMS, in which some of the world’s major manufacturing industries participated.