Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems 17(3), pages 432–456
December 2008
In this article we focus on the notion of artifact for agents in MAS (multi-agent systems) as a basis for a new meta-model promoting the modelling and engineering of agent societies and MAS environment as first-class entities. Its conceptual foundations lay upon theories and results coming from computational sciences as well as from organisational and cognitive sciences, psychology, CSCW, anthropology and ethology. In the resulting A&A (agents & artifacts) meta-model, agents are the (pro-)active entities in charge of the goals/tasks that altogether build up the whole MAS behaviour, whereas artifacts are the reactive entities providing the services and functions that make individual agents work together in a MAS, and that shape agent environment according to the MAS needs.
<div>After presenting the scientific background, we define the notions of artifact in the A&A meta-model, discuss how it affects the notion of intelligence in MAS, and show its application to a number of agent-related research fields.</div>
keywords
Artifact · A&A meta-model · MAS environment · Activity theory · Distributed cognition · Coordination · Agent intelligence · Agent-oriented software engineering (AOSE) · MAS infrastructure
origin event
journal or series
Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems
(J.AAMAS)
container publication
funding project
AgentLink III — A Coordination Network for Agent-based Computing
(01/01/2004–31/01/2006)
Special Issue on Foundations, Advanced Topics and Industrial Perspectives of Multi-agent Systems (special issue, 2008) — Andrea Omicini, Peter McBurney