APPLICATION OF MULTI-AGENT TECHNOLOGY TO INFORMATION SYSTEMS: AN AGENT-BASED DESIGN ARCHITECTURE FOR DECISION SUPPORT SYSTEMS

One of the most difficult issues in building efficient Information Systems ( IS) is the integration of these systems with the organization's other systems. This issue is particularly acute for Decision Support Systems (DSSs). To become more effective and efficient, a DSS must have an open structure to adapt to the dynamic environment. However, current IS, especially DSSs, tend to rely excessively on traditional System Development Life Cycle (SDLC) and this places limitations on current systems' infrastructures. The emergence of multi-agent technology addresses this issue and its applications to IS are becoming highly efficient. In this paper, we introduce a Matrix-Agent connection design, called Agent based Open Connectivity for Decision Support Systems (AOCD), which balances the manageability and flexibility in a system and maximizes system performance.