Towards Interaction Protocol Operations for Large Multi-agent Systems

2006 2nd IEEE International Symposium on Dependable, Autonomic and Secure Computing

Sterritt

et al. 2006

Autonomic Computing (AC), self-management based on high level guidance from humans, is increasingly gaining momentum as the way forward in designing reliable systems that hide complexity and conquer IT management costs. Effectively, AC may be viewed as Policy-Based SelfManagement. The Model Driven Architecture (MDA) approach focuses on building models that can be transformed into code in an automatic manner. In this paper, we look at ways to implement Policy-Based Self-Management by means of models that can be converted to code using transformations that follow the MDA philosophy. We propose a set of UML-based models to specify autonomic and autonomous features along with the necessary procedures, based on modification and composition of models, to deploy a policy as an executing system.

Section: Proposed Modelsmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…We provide several algorithms to assist in this task: extraction of a role plan from the role model plan and vice versa, and aggregation of several role plans; see [12] for further details of these algorithms.…”

Section: Composing Plansmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Model-Driven Architecture Approach for Modeling, Specifying and Deploying Policies in Autonomous and Autonomic Systems

2006 2nd IEEE International Symposium on Dependable, Autonomic and Secure Computing

Sterritt

et al. 2006

“…We provide several algorithms to assist this task: extraction of a role plan from the role model plan and vice versa, and aggregation of several role plans; see [23] for further details of these algorithms. Thanks to these algorithms, we can keep both plan views consistent automatically.…”

Section: Composing Plansmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…In order to represent interactions abstractly, we use multi-role interactions (mRI) [23,24]. mRIs are first class modeling elements in our models and are used as the minimum building block for modeling.…”

Section: Overview Of Macmas/umlmentioning

confidence: 99%

Building and implementing policies in autonomous and autonomic systems using MaCMAS

Innovations Syst Softw Eng

Sterritt

et al. 2007

Autonomic Computing, self-management based on high level guidance from humans, is increasingly being accepted as a means forward in designing reliable systems that both hide complexity from the user and control IT management costs. Effectively, AC may be viewed as policy-based self-management. We look at ways of achieving this, with particular focus on agent-oriented software engineering. We propose utilizing MaCMAS, an AOSE methodology for specifying autonomic and autonomous properties of the system independently. Later, by means of composition of these specifications, guided by a policy specification, we construct a specification for the policy and its subsequent deployment. We illustrate this by means of a case study based on a NASA concept mission and describe future work on a support toolkit.

“…Layer Completion: It consists in producing a new acquaintance organization model because of the composition or the decomposition of a model(s) developed in a previous iteration or in the build initial acquaintance organization work definition. The model produced is used to fill a bottom/top layer when using decomposition/composition of mRIs and is used to reduce/augment a model maintaining the level of abstraction when using decomposition/composition of role models, thus performing a top-down or bottomup designs [45,46]. These processes are supported by formal methods that help us to perform these operations and to prove properties over models.…”

Section: Figure 3 Acquaintance Analysis Disciplinementioning

confidence: 99%

Using Formal Methods and Agent-Oriented Software Engineering for Modeling NASA Swarm-Based Systems

Rouff

2007 IEEE Swarm Intelligence Symposium

et al. 2007

NASA is researching advanced technologies for future exploration missions using intelligent swarms of robotic vehicles. One of these missions is the Autonomous Nano Technology Swarm (ANTS) mission that will explore the asteroid belt using 1,000 cooperative autonomous spacecraft.From the engineering point of view, the complexity of this kind of systems is one of the main challenges that has to be overcame, since it makes the behavior of the swarm unpredictable. In NASA, many approaches are being explored towards this goal, mainly, a tailored software engineering approach for this kind of systems, called agent-oriented software engineering, and formal methods. In this paper, we report on the main advances we have done towards modelling, implementing, and testing NASA swarms-based concept missions.