Embedding agents in business applications using enterprise integration patterns

This paper addresses the issue of integrating agents with a variety of external resources and services, as found in enterprise computing environments. We propose an approach for interfacing agents and existing message routing and mediation engines based on the endpoint concept from the enterprise integration patterns of Hohpe and Woolf. A design for agent endpoints is presented, and an architecture for connecting the Jason agent platform to the Apache Camel enterprise integration framework using this type of endpoint is described. The approach is illustrated by means of a business process use case, and a number of Camel routes are presented. These demonstrate the benefits of interfacing agents to external services via a specialised message routing tool that supports enterprise integration patterns

Monitoring Social Expectations in Second Life

Online virtual worlds such as Second Life provide a rich medium for unstructured human interaction in a shared simulated 3D environment. However, many human interactions take place in a structured social context where participants play particular roles and are subject to expectations governing their behaviour, and current virtual worlds do not provide any support for this type of interaction. There is therefore an opportunity to adapt the tools developed in the MAS community for structured social interactions between software agents (inspired by human society) and adapt these for use with the computer-mediated human communication provided by virtual worlds. This paper describes the application of one such tool for use with Second Life. A model checker for online monitoring of social expectations defined in temporal logic has been integrated with Second Life, allowing users to be notified when their expectations of others have been fulfilled or violated. Avatar actions in the virtual world are detected by a script, encoded as propositions and sent to the model checker, along with the social expectation rules to be monitored. Notifications of expectation fulfilment and violation are returned to the script to be displayed to the user. This utility of this tool is reliant on the ability of the Linden scripting language (LSL) to detect events of significance in the application domain, and a discussion is presented on how a range of monitored structured social scenarios could be realised despite the limitations of LSL

Obligation Norm Identification in Agent Societies

Most works on norms have investigated how norms are regulated using institutional mechanisms. Very few works have focused on how an agent may infer the norms of a society without the norm being explicitly given to the agent. This paper describes a mechanism for identifying one type of norm, an obligation norm. The Obligation Norm Inference (ONI) algorithm described in this paper makes use of an association rule mining approach to identify obligation norms. Using agent based simulation of a virtual restaurant we demonstrate how an agent can identify the tipping norm. The experiments that we have conducted demonstrate that an agent in the system is able to add, remove and modify norms dynamically. An agent can also flexibly modify the parameters of the system based on whether it is successful in identifying a norm.Norms, Social Norms, Obligations, Norm Identification, Agent-Based Simulation, Simulation of Norms, Artificial Societies, Normative Multi-Agent Systems (NorMAS)

Creating And Sharing Knowledge Through A Corporate Social Networking Site: The Impact Of Employees\u27 Perceptions On Effectiveness

There have been various claims that enterprise social networking sites (ESN) might improve business effectiveness and performance. Nevertheless, many of the initiatives supported by ESNs have failed. This paper argues that divergent perceptions about ESNs across the different levels of the organization may explain failures in ESNs’ design and implementation. Using an extended version of the Technological Frames of Reference framework (Orlikowski & Gash, 1994), this paper reports on a study that analyzed employee’s perceptions about an ESN within a software engineering firm. It was found that significant divergent perceptions in the organization led to a social order that discouraged employees to create and share knowledge through the ESN. This paper highlights the importance of aligning top management perceptions about the ESN with its actual scope. It also highlights the relevance of aligning perceptions about the ESN across the different levels of the organization. This paper proposes extending the original Technological Frames of Reference framework in order to better understand people’s perceptions about technologies that support knowledge management systems. It also proposes an explanatory model for understanding how people’s perceptions about a corporate social networking site impact on its usage

RFID/INTERNET OF THINGS SYSTEMS ON THE BOUNDARY BETWEEN PUBLIC AND PRIVATE SECTORS: AN ANT STUDY OF MULTIPLICITY

Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) systems are becoming increasingly common in applications that are shared between the public and private sectors. These systems facilitate supply chain, traceability and sensor functions, not to mention the application of RFID technology in enabling the Internet of Things. Despite their increasing ubiquity, the management of public-private RFID systems is under-researched and little understood. This research addresses a gap in literature by using Actor-Network Theory (ANT) to uncover the public-private RFID network. It was found that the public-private sector relationship is initially characterised by stereotypical views which diminish as sectors work together. Further, the public sector in this context was seen to be a multiplicity with four different performances, public sector as a member of the public-private partnership; as legislator; as enforcer and as funding provider. This multiplicity is shown to lead to confusion within public-private partnerships as members of the partnership are not always clear about which performance of the public sector they are enacting, or interacting with. ANT provided a sound basis to explore such a complex networked system, its inclusion of technology within the construction of the social offers a way of understanding complexity within internet of things based applications