An Agent Framework for Effective Data Transfer Stijn Bernaer Patrick De Causmaecker Joris Maervoet Greet Vanden Berghe ECUMICT 2004 Gent, 1-2 April 2004.

An Agent Framework for Effective Data Transfer

Stijn Bernaer

Patrick De Causmaecker

Joris Maervoet

Greet Vanden Berghe

ECUMICT 2004

Gent, 1-2 April 2004

Introduction

Disciplines

Case studies

Motivation

Agentorganisation

Conclusion

KaHo Sint-Lieven – Dpt. Industrial Engineering – IT Research Group

Framework for Effective Data Transfer

FrEDT is a generic agent organisation that manages client-server communication in a wireless environment

Runs on mobile devices with limited capacity

Based on 3 case studies

Still in development

Introduction

Disciplines

Case studies

Motivation

Agentorganisation

Conclusion

KaHo Sint-Lieven – Dpt. Industrial Engineering – IT Research Group

Agentarchitecture

Programming Platforms

Operating Systems

Agent Platforms

Wirelesstechnology

Pla

tform

sFrEDT

Disciplines

Introduction

Disciplines

Case studies

Motivation

Agentorganisation

Conclusion

KaHo Sint-Lieven – Dpt. Industrial Engineering – IT Research Group

Wireless communication technology

2.5G: 2G extensions for higher bitrates

Move from phone-oriented to data-oriented networks

Move from circuit-switched to packet-switched data

Average rates - GSM: 9.6 kbps - HSCSD: 28.8 kbps - GPRS: 40 kbps - UMTS: 384 kbps

Introduction

Disciplines

Case studies

Motivation

Agentorganisation

Conclusion

KaHo Sint-Lieven – Dpt. Industrial Engineering – IT Research Group

Agents

An agent is an encapsulated computer system, situated in some environment, and capable of flexible autonomous action in that environment in order to meet its design objectives (Jennings)

Agent interaction is inevitable to achieve individual objectives and to manage inter-dependencies (Jennings)

Introduction

Disciplines

Case studies

Motivation

Agentorganisation

Conclusion

KaHo Sint-Lieven – Dpt. Industrial Engineering – IT Research Group

Agents

A multi-agent system (MAS) is an organisation of several agents that act and interact

The agents in a MAS perform particular roles and obey particular norms and regulations

Agents are re-active, autonomous, pro-active, continuous and persistent, social, learning, mobile

Introduction

Disciplines

Case studies

Motivation

Agentorganisation

Conclusion

KaHo Sint-Lieven – Dpt. Industrial Engineering – IT Research Group

Platforms for mobile devices

Programming Platforms Personal Java

Java 2 Micro Edition (J2ME)

Operating SystemsSymbian OS

Palm OSWindows CE (Pocket PC)

Agent PlatformsAgentLightµFIPA-OS

JADE-LEAPGrasshopper

Introduction

Disciplines

Case studies

Motivation

Agentorganisation

Conclusion

KaHo Sint-Lieven – Dpt. Industrial Engineering – IT Research Group

Case 1 – Transfer of geographical data

Central geographical database

Mobile employees create Update Reports (UR)

Employees need to transfer these UR’s

Wireless synchronisation process between local and central Update Report DataBase (URDB)

Employees need the most recent Update Reports on regions that will be explored in the near future (pro-active)

Agents regulate the data traffic

Introduction

Disciplines

Case studies

Motivation

Agentorganisation

Conclusion

KaHo Sint-Lieven – Dpt. Industrial Engineering – IT Research Group

Case 2 – Supporting people with non-congenital brain injuries

People who have problems with coordinating and organising their daily life

Complete database on the supervisor’s computer and a subset of the data on the smartphone/PDA of the patient

Day’s schedule, addresses, instructions, itineraries, shopping lists

Optionally: mobile device for supervisor

Agents act as assistants

Introduction

Disciplines

Case studies

Motivation

Agentorganisation

Conclusion

KaHo Sint-Lieven – Dpt. Industrial Engineering – IT Research Group

Case 3 – Transfer of medical reports and analyses

Mobile employees visit companies for risk analysis, ergonomic analysis and medical inspection

Employees use a procedure handbook and a program to manage analysis records on their notebook

This book has to be updated regularly and changed records need to be exchanged with a central databank

Agents are connection-aware and run in background

Introduction

Disciplines

Case studies

Motivation

Agentorganisation

Conclusion

KaHo Sint-Lieven – Dpt. Industrial Engineering – IT Research Group

Motivation FrEDT

Case studies:

Client-server synchronisation mechanism

Transactions have different levels of urgency

Congestion should be avoided

Priority-based decision-making system

Negotiation about data transactions with certain priority

Introduction

Disciplines

Case studies

Motivation

Agentorganisation

Conclusion

KaHo Sint-Lieven – Dpt. Industrial Engineering – IT Research Group

Why agents?

Component-based environment

To assist the end user

Asynchronity = delay independence

Autonomy, continuity

Adaptivity, proactivity

Negotiation

Introduction

Disciplines

Case studies

Motivation

Agentorganisation

Conclusion

KaHo Sint-Lieven – Dpt. Industrial Engineering – IT Research Group

FrEDT: extensions

Connection awareness and reasoning about the connection (costs?)

Detachebility: the actual transfer does not need to be ACL (Agent Communication Language)

Fault-tolerance and security

Introduction

Disciplines

Case studies

Motivation

Agentorganisation

Conclusion

KaHo Sint-Lieven – Dpt. Industrial Engineering – IT Research Group

Agent organisation

RETSINA architecture: interface-, task and database agents

Framework developed in JADE (Java Agent DEvelopment Framework) with LEAP (Lightweight Extensible Agent PLatform) extensions

J2SE

Personal Java

J2ME: MIDP/CLDC

Introduction

Disciplines

Case studies

Motivation

Agentorganisation

Conclusion

KaHo Sint-Lieven – Dpt. Industrial Engineering – IT Research Group

Conclusion

FrEDT is suited for effective datatransfer in different situations

FrEDT joins several disciplines: agents, mobile devices and wireless communication technology

Further research:

Fault-tolerance and security

Application to the cases