VISTA - A USER INTERFACE FOR A DISTRIBUTED OBJECT-ORIENTED SOFTWARE ENGINEERING ENVIRONMENT

This paper describes a prototype user interface for a distributed software engineering environment, where the components of the environment are autonomous agents with some inherent decision-making capabilities. Agents may be distributed across a local- or wide-area network. Two forms of interaction are supported; namely, direct manipulation and message passing. Synchronous interaction is supported via the direct manipulation of system objects. Asynchronous interaction is managed by a central server agent, distributing electronic mail messages to the appropriate human or automated agents. The functionality of the system is illustrated by examples drawn from the domain of software development.