Erlang implementation of a virtual machine for executing Teleo-Reactive programmes

In this project an architecture for the interpretation of TeleoR programs in Erlang is presented. To be able to undertake this work, the following objectives have been set: -Studying the Teleo-Reactive approach :The functionality of the Teleo-Reactive paradigm is being studied briefly, in order to know its main characteristics, focusing in its extension: TeleoR. Studying the programming language Erlang: An introduction to functional programming and the Erlang language are being studied. It covers the Erlang syntaxes and the Open Telecom Platformframework (OTP). -Implementing the interpretation architecture: It is going to be design a general procedure to translate a TeleoR program into Erlang, using three versions of a concrete TeleoR program. -Testing the implementation in a Raspberry PI: The implementation of an example of TeleoR program is going to be tested in a Raspberry PI, so as to check its proper working.Escuela Técnica Superior de Ingeniería de TelecomunicaciónUniversidad Politécnica de Cartagen

Agent programming in the cognitive era

It is claimed that, in the nascent ‘Cognitive Era’, intelligent systems will be trained using machine learning techniques rather than programmed by software developers. A contrary point of view argues that machine learning has limitations, and, taken in isolation, cannot form the basis of autonomous systems capable of intelligent behaviour in complex environments. In this paper, we explore the contributions that agent-oriented programming can make to the development of future intelligent systems. We briefly review the state of the art in agent programming, focussing particularly on BDI-based agent programming languages, and discuss previous work on integrating AI techniques (including machine learning) in agent-oriented programming. We argue that the unique strengths of BDI agent languages provide an ideal framework for integrating the wide range of AI capabilities necessary for progress towards the next-generation of intelligent systems. We identify a range of possible approaches to integrating AI into a BDI agent architecture. Some of these approaches, e.g., ‘AI as a service’, exploit immediate synergies between rapidly maturing AI techniques and agent programming, while others, e.g., ‘AI embedded into agents’ raise more fundamental research questions, and we sketch a programme of research directed towards identifying the most appropriate ways of integrating AI capabilities into agent programs

Logic-based Technologies for Multi-agent Systems: A Systematic Literature Review

Precisely when the success of artificial intelligence (AI) sub-symbolic techniques makes them be identified with the whole AI by many non-computerscientists and non-technical media, symbolic approaches are getting more and more attention as those that could make AI amenable to human understanding. Given the recurring cycles in the AI history, we expect that a revamp of technologies often tagged as “classical AI” – in particular, logic-based ones will take place in the next few years. On the other hand, agents and multi-agent systems (MAS) have been at the core of the design of intelligent systems since their very beginning, and their long-term connection with logic-based technologies, which characterised their early days, might open new ways to engineer explainable intelligent systems. This is why understanding the current status of logic-based technologies for MAS is nowadays of paramount importance. Accordingly, this paper aims at providing a comprehensive view of those technologies by making them the subject of a systematic literature review (SLR). The resulting technologies are discussed and evaluated from two different perspectives: the MAS and the logic-based ones

An Application of Declarative Languages in Distributed Architectures: ASP and DALI Microservices

In this paper we introduce an approach to the possible adoption of Answer Set Programming (ASP) for the definition of microservices, which are a successful abstraction for designing distributed applications as suites of independently deployable interacting components. Such ASP-based components might be employed in distributed architectures related to Cloud Computing or to the Internet of Things (IoT), where the ASP microservices might be usefully coordinated with intelligent logic-based agents. We develop a case study where we consider ASP microservices in synergy with agents defined in DALI, a well-known logic-based agent-oriented programming language developed by our research group

Desarrollo automatizado de sistemas teleo-reactivos a partir de objetivos: un enfoque basado en componentes y dirigido por modelos

[SPA] Esta tesis doctoral se presenta bajo la modalidad de compendio de publicaciones. Está formada por un total de cuatro artículos publicados en revistas del segundo cuartil del Journal Citation Reports. El artículo “A systematic literature review of the Teleo-Reactive paradigm” ofrece una completa revisión sistemática de la literatura existente sobre el paradigma Teleo-Reactivo desde su presentación por el profesor Nils Nilsson en el año 1994. Su papel en esta tesis es el de servir de estado del arte de dicho paradigma, ofreciendo una buena perspectiva de la evolución de los sistemas Teleo-Reactivos desde su formulación hasta el presente. Para poder desarrollar sistemas Teleo-Reactivos a partir de objetivos, surgió la necesidad de especificar los requisitos de estos sistemas usando el lenguaje más apropiado. Ese es uno de los objetivos principales del artículo “A controlled experiment to evaluate the understandability of KAOS and i* for modeling Teleo-Reactive systems”. Como resultado de dicho trabajo se decidió utilizar i* dado que el experimento realizado mostró que las especificaciones realizadas con dicho lenguaje resultaban ligeramente más comprensibles que las realizadas con KAOS. Aunque i* resultaba más comprensible a la hora de especificar requisitos para sistemas Teleo-Reactivos, también presentaba ciertas debilidades. Estas debilidades han sido descritas detalladamente en el artículo “A family of experiments to evaluate the understandability of TRiStar and i* for modeling Teleo-Reactive systems”, en el que además se propone una extensión al lenguaje que permite superarlas. La extensión propuesta se denomina TRiStar y fue inicialmente presentada en [Morales15]. TRiStar ha demostrado superar los problemas de comprensibilidad identificados en i* en el modelado de sistemas Teleo-Reactivos mediante una familia de experimentos realizada con estudiantes de últimos cursos de grado y con desarrolladores software experimentados, cuyos resultados se exponen exhaustivamente en el artículo mencionado. En él se describe, además, un mecanismo que permite obtener mediante transformación de modelos el programa Teleo-Reactivo equivalente a un diagrama TRiStar dado. TRiStar permite, por lo tanto, partiendo de los objetivos de un sistema Teleo-Reactivo obtener un diagrama que especifique su comportamiento. Ese diagrama puede ser transformado en un programa Teleo-Reactivo equivalente. Y siguiendo las transformaciones descritas en “From Teleo-Reactive specifications to architectural components: a model-driven approach” se puede obtener a partir del programa Teleo-Reactivo el modelo de componentes y la máquina de estados que describe el comportamiento de cada uno de esos componentes. Con estos elementos y usando un framework como el descrito en [Iborra09] se cerraría el proceso de desarrollo del sistema Teleo-Reactivo. Como resultado de las investigaciones realizadas en el transcurso de esta tesis, y aunque no forma parte del compendio, hay un quinto artículo [Sánchez16] que está en segunda revisión en el Journal of Systems and Software en el que se estudian las posibilidades de introducir requisitos de tiempo real cuando se sigue el enfoque Teleo-Reactivo desde el modelado a la implementación de un sistema. Tras realizar un estudio del tipo de restricciones temporales que se pueden imponer desde el punto de vista Teleo-Reactivo, se considera la posibilidad de utilizar TeleoR [Clark14] para incorporar dichas restricciones y se proponene una serie de extensiones a TRiStar para permitir representar requisitos temporales. Estas extensiones dan lugar a lo que hemos llamado TRiStar+. [ENG] This doctoral dissertation has been presented in the form of thesis by publication. It is comprised of four articles indexed in the second quartile of the Journal Citation Reports. The article “A systematic literature review of the Teleo-Reactive paradigm” offers a complete systematic review of the existing literature on the Teleo-Reactive paradigm since Prof. Nils Nilsson presented it in 1994. It plays the role of state of the art of that paradigm, showing a perspective of the evolution of Teleo-Reactive systems from their formulation to present time. In order to develop Teleo-Reactive systems starting from its goals, there is the need of specifying the requirements of these systems using the most adequate language. That is one of the main objectives of the article “A controlled experiment to evaluate the understandability of KAOS and i* for modeling Teleo-Reactive systems”. As a result, we decided to use i* because the experiment showed that i* specifications where slightly more understandable than those made using KAOS. Although i* was more understandable when specifying requirements for Teleo-Reactive systems, the experiment also showed some shortcomings. These shortcomings have been deeply described in the article “A family of experiments to evaluate the understandability of TRiStar and i* for modeling Teleo-Reactive systems”. In this article, an extension to i* is proposed in order to overcome the identified limitations. The proposed extension is named TRiStar and was initially presented at [Morales15]. TRiStar has shown to be more understandable than i* when modeling Teleo-Reactive systems through a family of experiments done with last year students and experienced software developers, whose results are described in the aforementioned article. In that article, a mechanism to obtain a Teleo-Reactive program starting from a TRiStar diagram is also described. Therefore, TRiStar allows obtaining a diagram which specifies the behavior of a Teleo-Reactive system starting from its goals. That diagram can be transformed into an equivalent Teleo-Reactive program. Then, following the transformations described in “From Teleo-Reactive specifications to architectural components: a model-driven approach”, a component model and the state machine describing the behavior of each of those components can be obtained. With these elements and using a framework as that described in [Iborra09], the development process of the Teleo-Reactive system would be finished. As a result of the research carried out during this dissertation there is another article, which is not comprised in the compilation, in second revision at the Journal of Systems and Software [Sánchez16]. In that article, after making a study of the type of timing constraints from the TR perspective, we consider the possibility of using TeleoR [Clark14] for incorporating such constraints. Some extensions on TRiStar notation are proposed to represent temporal requirements. Those extensions have been named TRiStar+.[ENG] This doctoral dissertation has been presented in the form of thesis by publication. It is comprised of four articles indexed in the second quartile of the Journal Citation Reports. The article “A systematic literature review of the Teleo-Reactive paradigm” offers a complete systematic review of the existing literature on the Teleo-Reactive paradigm since Prof. Nils Nilsson presented it in 1994. It plays the role of state of the art of that paradigm, showing a perspective of the evolution of Teleo-Reactive systems from their formulation to present time. In order to develop Teleo-Reactive systems starting from its goals, there is the need of specifying the requirements of these systems using the most adequate language. That is one of the main objectives of the article “A controlled experiment to evaluate the understandability of KAOS and i* for modeling Teleo-Reactive systems”. As a result, we decided to use i* because the experiment showed that i* specifications where slightly more understandable than those made using KAOS. Although i* was more understandable when specifying requirements for Teleo-Reactive systems, the experiment also showed some shortcomings. These shortcomings have been deeply described in the article “A family of experiments to evaluate the understandability of TRiStar and i* for modeling Teleo-Reactive systems”. In this article, an extension to i* is proposed in order to overcome the identified limitations. The proposed extension is named TRiStar and was initially presented at [Morales15]. TRiStar has shown to be more understandable than i* when modeling Teleo-Reactive systems through a family of experiments done with last year students and experienced software developers, whose results are described in the aforementioned article. In that article, a mechanism to obtain a Teleo-Reactive program starting from a TRiStar diagram is also described. Therefore, TRiStar allows obtaining a diagram which specifies the behavior of a Teleo-Reactive system starting from its goals. That diagram can be transformed into an equivalent Teleo-Reactive program. Then, following the transformations described in “From Teleo-Reactive specifications to architectural components: a model-driven approach”, a component model and the state machine describing the behavior of each of those components can be obtained. With these elements and using a framework as that described in [Iborra09], the development process of the Teleo-Reactive system would be finished. As a result of the research carried out during this dissertation there is another article, which is not comprised in the compilation, in second revision at the Journal of Systems and Software [Sánchez16]. In that article, after making a study of the type of timing constraints from the TR perspective, we consider the possibility of using TeleoR [Clark14] for incorporating such constraints. Some extensions on TRiStar notation are proposed to represent temporal requirements. Those extensions have been named TRiStar+.Universidad Politécnica de CartagenaPrograma Oficial de Doctorado en Tecnologías de la Información y Comunicacione

COBOT : teatro robótico educativo orientado a las emociones y el realismo

Durante los últimos años se ha experimentado y realizado proyectos en torno al teatro robótico, el cual también incurre en la educación como un medio de apoyo al aprendizaje. Un gran reto del teatro robótico es el desarrollo de robots actores expresivos y creíbles para que puedan transmitir adecuadamente a la audiencia el mensaje deseado. Ante este reto, se desarrolló el sistema llamado COBOT, cuyo objetivo se centra en mejorar la expresión de acciones de los robots actores en las obras de teatro. Para esto se desarrolló el sistema que, partiendo del estado emocional del robot, el entorno y las capacidades físicas de este, modula las acciones emocionalmente para luego ser interpretadas. La solución fue validada con usuarios entre los 7 y los 11 años.During recent years, projects around robotic theater had been made. They involve education as a mean of supporting learning. A great challenge of robotic theater is the development of credible and expressive robot actors so that they can adequately convey the desired message to the audience. Faced with this challenge, the system called COBOT was developed, whose objective is to improve the expression of actions of robot actors in plays. To reach that goal, the system was developed, which based on the robot's emotional state, the environment, and its physical capacities, modulates the actions emotionally to be afterwards interpreted. The solution was validated with users between 7 and 11 years old.Ingeniero (a) de SistemasPregrad

Concurrent task programming of robotic agents in TeleoR

TeleoR is a major extension of Nilsson's Teleo-Reactive (TR) rule based robotic agent programming language. Programs comprise sequences of guarded action rules grouped into parameterised procedures. The guards are deductive queries to a set of rapidly changing percept and other dynamic facts in the agent's Belief Store. The actions are either tuples of primitive actions for external robotic resources, to be executed in parallel, or a single call to a TeleoR procedure, which can be a recursive call. The guards form a sub-goal tree routed at the guard of the first rule. When partially instantiated by the arguments of some call, this guard is the goal of the call. TeleoR extends TR in being typed and higher order, with extra forms of rules that allow finer control over sub-goal achieving task behaviour. Its Belief Store inference language is a higher order logic+function rule language, QuLog. QuLog also has action rules and primitive actions for updating the Belief Store and sending messages. The action of a TeleoR rule may be a combination of the action of a TR rule and a sequence of QuLog actions. TeleoR's most important extension of TR is the concept of task atomic procedures, some arguments of which belong to a special but application specific resource type. This allows the high level programming of multitasking agents using multiple robotic resources. When two or more tasks need to use overlapping resources their use is alternated between task atomic calls in each task, in such a way that there is no interference, deadlock or task starvation. This multi-task programming is illustrated by giving the essentials of a program for an agent controlling two robotic arms in multiple block tower assembly tasks. It has been used to control both a Python interactive graphical simulation and a Baxter robot building real block towers, in each case with help or hindrance from a human. The arms move in parallel whenever it can be done without risk of clashing