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

Metaheuristic Design Patterns: New Perspectives for Larger-Scale Search Architectures

Design patterns capture the essentials of recurring best practice in an abstract form. Their merits are well established in domains as diverse as architecture and software development. They offer significant benefits, not least a common conceptual vocabulary for designers, enabling greater communication of high-level concerns and increased software reuse. Inspired by the success of software design patterns, this chapter seeks to promote the merits of a pattern-based method to the development of metaheuristic search software components. To achieve this, a catalog of patterns is presented, organized into the families of structural, behavioral, methodological and component-based patterns. As an alternative to the increasing specialization associated with individual metaheuristic search components, the authors encourage computer scientists to embrace the ‘cross cutting' benefits of a pattern-based perspective to optimization algorithms. Some ways in which the patterns might form the basis of further larger-scale metaheuristic component design automation are also discussed

Operator interfaces for the lifecycle support of component based automation systems

Current manufacturing automation systems (specifically the powertrain sector) have been facing challenges with constant pressures of globalisation, environmental concerns and ICT (Information and Communication Technology) innovations. These challenges instigate new demands for shorter product lifecycles and require customised products to be manufactured as efficiently as possible. Manufacturing systems must therefore be agile to remain competitive by supporting frequent reconfigurations involving distributed engineering activities. [Continues.

A rule-based method for scalable and traceable evaluation of system architectures

Despite the development of a variety of decision-aid tools for assessing the value of a conceptual design, humans continue to play a dominant role in this process. Researchers have identified two major challenges to automation, namely the subjectivity of value and the existence of multiple and conflicting customer needs. A third challenge is however arising as the amount of data (e.g., expert judgment, requirements, and engineering models) required to assess value increases. This brings two challenges. First, it becomes harder to modify existing knowledge or add new knowledge into the knowledge base. Second, it becomes harder to trace the results provided by the tool back to the design variables and model parameters. Current tools lack the scalability and traceability required to tackle these knowledge-intensive design evaluation problems. This work proposes a traceable and scalable rule-based architecture evaluation tool called VASSAR that is especially tailored to tackle knowledge-intensive problems that can be formulated as configuration design problems, which is demonstrated using the conceptual design task for a laptop. The methodology has three main steps. First, facts containing the capabilities and performance of different architectures are computed using rules containing physical and logical models. Second, capabilities are compared with requirements to assess satisfaction of each requirement. Third, requirement satisfaction is aggregated to yield a manageable number of metrics. An explanation facility keeps track of the value chain all along this process. This paper describes the methodology in detail and discusses in particular different implementations of preference functions as logical rules. A full-scale example around the design of Earth observing satellites is presented

Implementation of context-aware workflows with Multi-agent Systems

Systems in Ambient Intelligence (AmI) need to manage workflows that represent users’ activities. These workflows can be quite complex, as they may involve multiple participants, both physical and computational, playing different roles. Their execution implies monitoring the development of the activities in the environment, and taking the necessary actions for them and the workflow to reach a certain end. The context-aware approach supports the development of these applications to cope with event processing and regarding information issues. Modeling the actors in these context-aware workflows, where complex decisions and interactions must be considered, can be achieved with multi-agent systems. Agents are autonomous entities with sophisticated and flexible behaviors, which are able to adapt to complex and evolving environments, and to collaborate to reach common goals. This work presents architectural patterns to integrate agents on top of an existing context-aware architecture. This allows an additional abstraction layer on top of context-aware systems, where knowledge management is performed by agents.This approach improves the flexibility of AmI systems and facilitates their design. A case study on guiding users in buildings to their meetings illustrates this approach

Second CLIPS Conference Proceedings, volume 2

Papers presented at the 2nd C Language Integrated Production System (CLIPS) Conference held at the Lyndon B. Johnson Space Center (JSC) on 23-25 September 1991 are documented in these proceedings. CLIPS is an expert system tool developed by the Software Technology Branch at NASA JSC and is used at over 4000 sites by government, industry, and business. During the three days of the conference, over 40 papers were presented by experts from NASA, Department of Defense, other government agencies, universities, and industry

Development and Specification of Virtual Environments

This thesis concerns the issues involved in the development of virtual environments (VEs). VEs are more than virtual reality. We identify four main characteristics of them: graphical interaction, multimodality, interface agents, and multi-user. These characteristics are illustrated with an overview of different classes of VE-like applications, and a number of state-of-the-art VEs. To further define the topic of research, we propose a general framework for VE systems development, in which we identify five major classes of development tools: methodology, guidelines, design specification, analysis, and development environments. Of each, we give an overview of existing best practices

Multi Agent Systems in Logistics: A Literature and State-of-the-art Review

Based on a literature survey, we aim to answer our main question: “How should we plan and execute logistics in supply chains that aim to meet today’s requirements, and how can we support such planning and execution using IT?†Today’s requirements in supply chains include inter-organizational collaboration and more responsive and tailored supply to meet specific demand. Enterprise systems fall short in meeting these requirements The focus of planning and execution systems should move towards an inter-enterprise and event-driven mode. Inter-organizational systems may support planning going from supporting information exchange and henceforth enable synchronized planning within the organizations towards the capability to do network planning based on available information throughout the network. We provide a framework for planning systems, constituting a rich landscape of possible configurations, where the centralized and fully decentralized approaches are two extremes. We define and discuss agent based systems and in particular multi agent systems (MAS). We emphasize the issue of the role of MAS coordination architectures, and then explain that transportation is, next to production, an important domain in which MAS can and actually are applied. However, implementation is not widespread and some implementation issues are explored. In this manner, we conclude that planning problems in transportation have characteristics that comply with the specific capabilities of agent systems. In particular, these systems are capable to deal with inter-organizational and event-driven planning settings, hence meeting today’s requirements in supply chain planning and execution.supply chain;MAS;multi agent systems

Multimodal agents for cooperative interaction

2020 Fall.Includes bibliographical references.Embodied virtual agents offer the potential to interact with a computer in a more natural manner, similar to how we interact with other people. To reach this potential requires multimodal interaction, including both speech and gesture. This project builds on earlier work at Colorado State University and Brandeis University on just such a multimodal system, referred to as Diana. I designed and developed a new software architecture to directly address some of the difficulties of the earlier system, particularly with regard to asynchronous communication, e.g., interrupting the agent after it has begun to act. Various other enhancements were made to the agent systems, including the model itself, as well as speech recognition, speech synthesis, motor control, and gaze control. Further refactoring and new code were developed to achieve software engineering goals that are not outwardly visible, but no less important: decoupling, testability, improved networking, and independence from a particular agent model. This work, combined with the effort of others in the lab, has produced a "version 2'' Diana system that is well positioned to serve the lab's research needs in the future. In addition, in order to pursue new research opportunities related to developmental and intervention science, a "Faelyn Fox'' agent was developed. This is a different model, with a simplified cognitive architecture, and a system for defining an experimental protocol (for example, a toy-sorting task) based on Unity's visual state machine editor. This version too lays a solid foundation for future research