Querying Large Physics Data Sets Over an Information Grid

Optimising use of the Web (WWW) for LHC data analysis is a complex problem and illustrates the challenges arising from the integration of and computation across massive amounts of information distributed worldwide. Finding the right piece of information can, at times, be extremely time-consuming, if not impossible. So-called Grids have been proposed to facilitate LHC computing and many groups have embarked on studies of data replication, data migration and networking philosophies. Other aspects such as the role of 'middleware' for Grids are emerging as requiring research. This paper positions the need for appropriate middleware that enables users to resolve physics queries across massive data sets. It identifies the role of meta-data for query resolution and the importance of Information Grids for high-energy physics analysis rather than just Computational or Data Grids. This paper identifies software that is being implemented at CERN to enable the querying of very large collaborating HEP data-sets, initially being employed for the construction of CMS detectors.Comment: 4 pages, 3 figure

Is a Semantic Web Agent a Knowledge-Savvy Agent?

The issue of knowledge sharing has permeated the field of distributed AI and in particular, its successor, multiagent systems. Through the years, many research and engineering efforts have tackled the problem of encoding and sharing knowledge without the need for a single, centralized knowledge base. However, the emergence of modern computing paradigms such as distributed, open systems have highlighted the importance of sharing distributed and heterogeneous knowledge at a larger scale—possibly at the scale of the Internet. The very characteristics that define the Semantic Web—that is, dynamic, distributed, incomplete, and uncertain knowledge—suggest the need for autonomy in distributed software systems. Semantic Web research promises more than mere management of ontologies and data through the definition of machine-understandable languages. The openness and decentralization introduced by multiagent systems and service-oriented architectures give rise to new knowledge management models, for which we can’t make a priori assumptions about the type of interaction an agent or a service may be engaged in, and likewise about the message protocols and vocabulary used. We therefore discuss the problem of knowledge management for open multi-agent systems, and highlight a number of challenges relating to the exchange and evolution of knowledge in open environments, which pertinent to both the Semantic Web and Multi Agent System communities alike

The simplicity project: easing the burden of using complex and heterogeneous ICT devices and services

As of today, to exploit the variety of different "services", users need to configure each of their devices by using different procedures and need to explicitly select among heterogeneous access technologies and protocols. In addition to that, users are authenticated and charged by different means. The lack of implicit human computer interaction, context-awareness and standardisation places an enormous burden of complexity on the shoulders of the final users. The IST-Simplicity project aims at leveraging such problems by: i) automatically creating and customizing a user communication space; ii) adapting services to user terminal characteristics and to users preferences; iii) orchestrating network capabilities. The aim of this paper is to present the technical framework of the IST-Simplicity project. This paper is a thorough analysis and qualitative evaluation of the different technologies, standards and works presented in the literature related to the Simplicity system to be developed

Internet of robotic things : converging sensing/actuating, hypoconnectivity, artificial intelligence and IoT Platforms

The Internet of Things (IoT) concept is evolving rapidly and influencing newdevelopments in various application domains, such as the Internet of MobileThings (IoMT), Autonomous Internet of Things (A-IoT), Autonomous Systemof Things (ASoT), Internet of Autonomous Things (IoAT), Internetof Things Clouds (IoT-C) and the Internet of Robotic Things (IoRT) etc.that are progressing/advancing by using IoT technology. The IoT influencerepresents new development and deployment challenges in different areassuch as seamless platform integration, context based cognitive network integration,new mobile sensor/actuator network paradigms, things identification(addressing, naming in IoT) and dynamic things discoverability and manyothers. The IoRT represents new convergence challenges and their need to be addressed, in one side the programmability and the communication ofmultiple heterogeneous mobile/autonomous/robotic things for cooperating,their coordination, configuration, exchange of information, security, safetyand protection. Developments in IoT heterogeneous parallel processing/communication and dynamic systems based on parallelism and concurrencyrequire new ideas for integrating the intelligent “devices”, collaborativerobots (COBOTS), into IoT applications. Dynamic maintainability, selfhealing,self-repair of resources, changing resource state, (re-) configurationand context based IoT systems for service implementation and integrationwith IoT network service composition are of paramount importance whennew “cognitive devices” are becoming active participants in IoT applications.This chapter aims to be an overview of the IoRT concept, technologies,architectures and applications and to provide a comprehensive coverage offuture challenges, developments and applications

Service-oriented agents for collaborative industrial automation and production systems

Service-oriented Multi-Agent Systems (SoMAS) is an approach to combine the fundamental characteristics of service-oriented and multi-agent methods into a new platform for industrial automation. Several research works already targeted the connection of these technologies, presenting different perspectives in how and why to join them. This research focuses on available efforts and solutions in the area of SoMAS and explains the idea behind the service-oriented agents in industrial automation. A SoMAS system is mainly composed by shared resources in form of services and their providing/requesting agents. The paper also discusses the required engineering aspects of these systems, from the internal anatomy to the interaction patterns. Parameters of flexibility, reconfiguration, autonomy and reduced development efforts were considered and they should be the trademark of SoMAS. Aiming to illustrate the proposed approach, an example of service-oriented automation agents is given.The authors would like to thank the European Commission and the partners of the EU IST FP6 project “Service-Oriented Cross-layer infrastructure for Distributed smart Embedded devices” (SOCRADES), the EU FP6 "Network of Excellence for Innovative Production Machines and Systems” (I*PROMS), and the EC ICT FP7 project “Cooperating Objects Network of Excellence” (CONET) for their support

A commentary on standardization in the Semantic Web, Common Logic and MultiAgent Systems

Given the ubiquity of the Web, the Semantic Web (SW) offers MultiAgent Systems (MAS) a most wide-ranging platform by which they could intercommunicate. It can be argued however that MAS require levels of logic that the current Semantic Web has yet to provide. As ISO Common Logic (CL) ISO/IEC IS 24707:2007 provides a firstorder logic capability for MAS in an interoperable way, it seems natural to investigate how CL may itself integrate with the SW thus providing a more expressive means by which MAS can interoperate effectively across the SW. A commentary is accordingly presented on how this may be achieved. Whilst it notes that certain limitations remain to be addressed, the commentary proposes that standardising the SW with CL provides the vehicle by which MAS can achieve their potential.</p