Applying the MVC design pattern to multi-agent systems

As agent technology becomes more wide-spread, the need for agent-based analysis and design methods and tools will keep growing. An agent, which is an autonomous entity that acts on behalf of the user, has different properties than objects. For example, objects are passive entities that react to external stimuli, but do not exhibit goal directed behavior. On the other hand, agents are active entities that may learn about their environment and react to changes. Because of such crucial differences between objects and agents, object-oriented analysis and design methods cannot accommodate the requirements of engineering agent-based systems. Agents, however, can learn a few things from object-oriented analysis and design. In this paper, we present the Agent Views approach for applying the Model View Controller (MVC) design pattern in designing agent-based systems. This approach will help software developers use a familiar design pattern to determine the types of agents needed to build successful agent-based systems

A Multi-Agent Architecture for An Intelligent Web-Based Educational System

An intelligent educational system must constitute an adaptive system built on multi-agent system architecture. The multi-agent architecture component provides self-organization, self-direction, and other control functionalities that are crucially important for an educational system. On the other hand, the adaptiveness of the system is necessary to provide customization, diversification, and interactional functionalities. Therefore, an educational system architecture that integrates multi-agent functionality [50] with adaptiveness can offer the learner the required independent learning experience. An educational system architecture is a complex structure with an intricate hierarchal organization where the functional components of the system undergo sophisticated and unpredictable internal interactions to perform its function. Hence, the system architecture must constitute adaptive and autonomous agents differentiated according to their functions, called multi-agent systems (MASs). The research paper proposes an adaptive hierarchal multi-agent educational system (AHMAES) [51] as an alternative to the traditional education delivery method. The document explains the various architectural characteristics of an adaptive multi-agent educational system and critically analyzes the system’s factors for software quality attributes

Introducing Collaboration in Single-user Applications through the Centralized Control Architecture

In this paper we describe a novel Model-View­ Controller based architecture, Centralized Control, that intro­duces collaboration in single-users applications. The architecture is able to add collaboration with no need to modify the source code of the original single-user application, and providing also the capability to introduce group semantics into the new, collab­orative application that is obtained. The architecture is shown in practice, by introducing CollabXMind, a collaborative mind map tool, that is based on a well-known single-user tool, XMind

A service-oriented cloud modeling method and process

The transition of software development from web to cloud has been accelerated. The development of cloud services requires a modeling method that reflects the characteristics of cloud including personalized service, resource sharing service, grouped and distributed services, and cross-platform operability. This study aimed to suggest a method of developing UML-based cloud services suitable for the characteristics of cloud services. A cloud service metamodel was defined using cloud applications’ characteristic modeling elements, and after that, how these cloud modeling elements are expressed into UML modeling elements was defined with an integrated metamodel between cloud and UML. By applying this hierarchical cloud metamodel, an MDA and MVC-based service-oriented cloud modeling process was established. By doing so, it will be possible to easily design services (applications) and solutions that are suitable for cloud computing environments, and in particular, to create hierarchical reuse models by the level of the abstraction of model-driven development

Frameworks for enhancing temporal interface behaviour through software architectural design

The work reported in this thesis is concerned with understanding aspects of temporal behaviour. A large part of the thesis is based on analytical studies of temporal properties and interface and architectural concerns. The main areas covered include: i. analysing long-term human processes and the impact of interruptions and delays ii. investigating how infrastructures can be designed to support synchronous fast pace activity iii.design of the Getting-to-Know (GtK) experimental notification server The work is motivated by the failure of many collaborative systems to effectively manage the temporal behaviour at the interface level, as they often assume that the interaction is taking place over fast, reliable local area networks. However, the Web has challenged this assumption and users are faced with frequent network-related delays. The nature of cooperative work increases the importance of timing issues. Collaborative users require both rapid feedback of their own actions and timely feedthrough of other actions. Although it may appear that software architectures are about the internals of system design and not a necessary concern for the user interface, internal details do show up at the surface in non-functional aspects, such as timing. The focus of this work is on understanding the behavioural aspects and how they are influenced by the infrastructure. The thesis has contributed to several areas of research: (a)the study of long-term work processes generated a trigger analysis technique for task decomposition in HCI (b)the analysis of architectures was later applied to investigate architectural options for mobile interfaces (c)the framework for notification servers commenced a design vocabulary in CSCW for the implementation of notification services, with the aim of improving design (d)the impedance matching framework facilitate both goal-directed feedthrough and awareness In particular, (c) and (d) have been exercised in the development of the GtK separable notification server