Automated Component-Based Configuration: Promises and Fallacies

Re-use of software components is standard practice in software design and development in which humans play an important role. In many dynamic environments, however, (semi-)automated configuration of systems, is warranted. This paper examines three such domains: Agent Factories, Web service configuration and general software composition. The differences and similarities between these approaches, and the progress that is being made are discussed

Specification of behavioural requirements within compositional multi-agent system design

In this paper it is shown how informal and formal specification of behavioural requirements and scenarios for agents and multi-agent systems can be integrated within multi-agent system design. In particular, it is addressed how a compositional perspective both on design descriptions and specification of behavioural requirements can be exploited. The approach has been applied in a case study: the development of a mediating information agent. It is shown that compositional verification benefits from the integration of requirements engineering within the design process

Redesign and reuse in compositional knowledge-based systems

The paper introduces a task model for the redesign of compositional knowledge-based systems based on a generic task model of design. A generic task model of design provides an abstract description of a design task and a generic structure which can be refined for design tasks in specific domains of application. A generic task model of design, shown to incorporate redesign, is presented and refined to a task model for the redesign of compositional knowledge-based systems. The applicability of this task model is illustrated for the redesign of a diagnostic knowledge-based system