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Agent intelligence and micro-agent Agent as an abstracted entity Agent architecture, MAS, Coordination Agent Negotiation
Software Engineering
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Agent
Sept. 2006
There are two kinds definition of agent Often quite narrow Extremely general
General definitions
... One that acts or has the power or authority to act ... or represent another
An agent is anything that can be viewed as perceiving its environment through sensors and acting upon that environment through effectors.
Maes, Parrie
Autonomous agents are computational systems that inhabit some complex dynamic environment, sense and act autonomously in this environment, and by doing so realize a set of goals or tasks for which they are designed.
Sept. 2006
Let us define an agent as a persistent software entity dedicated to a specific purpose. Persistent distinguishes agents from subroutines; agents have their own ideas about how to accomplish tasks, their own agendas. Special purpose distinguishes them from multifunction applications; agents are typically much smaller. Intelligent Agents continuously perform three functions: perception of dynamic conditions in the environment; action to affect conditions in the environment; and reasoning to interpret perceptions, solve problems, draw inferences, and determine actions.
Sept. 2006
Hayes-Roth
IBM
Intelligent agents are software entities that carry out some set of operations on behalf of a user or another program with some degree of independence or autonomy, and in doing so, employ some knowledge or representations of the users goals or desires
Sept. 2006
An Agent is a piece of hardware or (more commonly) softwarebased computer system that enjoys the following properties
Autonomy: agents operate without the direct intervention of humans or others, and have some kind of control over their actions and internal state;
Pro-activeness: agents do not simply act in response to their environment, they are able to exhibit goal-directed behavior by taking the initiative.
Reactivity: agents perceive their environment and respond to it in timely fashion to changes that occur in it. Social Ability: agents interact with other agents (and possibly humans) via some kind of agent-communication language.
Sept. 2006
Mobility: the ability of an agent to move around a network Veracity: agent will not knowingly communicate false information Benevolence: agents do not have conflicting goals and always try to do what is asked of it. Rationality: an agent will act in order to achieve its goals and will not act in such a way as to prevent its goals being achieved
Sept. 2006
Sept. 2006
Taskbots
Userbots
Sept. 2006
Thermostat
Software Daemon
Print server
Http server
Environment
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Type of environment
An agent will not have complete control over its environment, but have partial control, in that it can influence it.
Accessible vs. inaccessible Deterministic vs. non-deterministic Episodic vs. non-episodic Static vs. dynamic Discrete vs. continuous
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Sept. 2006
An accessible environment is one in which the agent can obtain complete, accurate, up-to-date information about the environments state. (also complete observable vs. partial observable) Accessible: sensor give complete state of the environment. In an accessible environment, agent neednt keep track of the world through its internal state.
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Sept. 2006
A deterministic environment is one in which any action has a single guaranteed effect , there is no uncertainty about the state that will result from performing an action. That is, next state of the environment is completely determined by the current state and the action select by the agent.
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In an episodic environment, the performance of an agent is dependent on a number of discrete episodes, with no link between the performance of an agent in different scenarios. It need not reason about the interaction between this and future episodes. (such as a game of chess) In an episodic environment, agent doesnt need to remember the past, and doesnt have to think the next episodic ahead.
Sept. 2006
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A static environment is one that can assumed to remain unchanged expect by the performance of actions by the agents.
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Sept. 2006
Discrete vs. continuous An environment is discrete if there are a fixed, finite number of actions and percepts in it.
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Sept. 2006
The type of environment largely determines the design of agent. Classifying environment can help guide the agents design process (like system analysis in software engineering). Most complex general class of environments
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Sept. 2006
planning model
Robot has three possible actions: paint (P), dry (W) and pickup (U)
State has four binary features: block painted, gripper dry, holding block, gripper clean
Initial state:
Goal state:
Sept. 2006
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An intelligent agent is one that is capable of flexible autonomous action in order to meet its design objectives, where flexibility means three things:
Pro-activeness: the ability of exhibit goal-directed behavior by taking the initiative. Reactivity: the ability of percept the environment, and respond in a timely fashion to changes that occur in it.
Social ability: the ability of interaction with other agents (include human).
Sept. 2006
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Pro-activeness
Pro-activeness
In functional system, apply pre-condition and postcondition to realize goal directed behavior. But for non-functional system (dynamic system), goal must remain valid at least until the action complete. agent blindly executing a procedure without regard to whether the assumptions underpinning the procedure are valid is a poor strategy.
Observe incompletely
Environment is non-deterministic
Other agent can affect the environment
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Sept. 2006
Reactivity
Reactivity
Agent must be responsive to events that occur in its environment. Building a system that achieves an effective balance between goal-directed and reactive behavior is hard.
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Sept. 2006
Social ability
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Sept. 2006
Object
Are defined as computational entities that encapsulate some state, are able to perform actions, or methods on this state, and communicate by message passing.
Are computational entities. Encapsulate some internal state. Are able to perform actions, or methods, to change this state. Communicate by message passing.
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Sept. 2006
An object can be thought of as exhibiting autonomy over its state: it has control over it. But an object does not exhibit control over its behavior. Other objects invoke their public method. Agent can only request other agents to perform actions. Objects do it for free, agents do it for money. (implement agents using object-oriented technology)Thinking it.
Sept. 2006
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In standard object model has nothing whatsoever to say about how to build systems that integrate reactive, pro-active, social behavior. Each has their own thread of control. In the standard object model, there is a single thread of control in the system. (agent is similar with an active object.) Summary,
Agent embody stronger notion of autonomy than object Agent are capable of flexible behavior Multi-agent system is inherently multi-threaded
Sept. 2006
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Expert system
Is one that is capable of solving problems or giving advice in some knowledge-rich domain. Expert system is disembodied, rather than being situated. It do not interact with any environment. Give feedback or advice to a third part. Are not required to interact with other agents.
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Sept. 2006
Example of agents
Mobile Customer
Mobile Customer
Agent (Peer)
Agent (Peer)
Mobile Customer
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Sept. 2006
DAI is a sub-field of AI DAI is concerned with problem solving where agents solve (sub-) tasks (macro level) Main area of DAI
Some histories
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Sept. 2006
Agent granularity (agent size) Heterogeneity agent (agent type) Methods of distributing control (among agents) Communication possibilities
Distributed AI
Artificial Intelligence
Multi-Agent Systems
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Sept. 2006
Issues of coordination of concurrent processes at the problem solving and representational level. Parallel computer architecture, parallel programming languages or distributed operation system. No semaphores, monitors or threads etc. Higher semantics of communication (speech-act level)
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Sept. 2006
To provide a solution to inherently distributed system To provide a solution where expertise is distributed To provide conceptual clarity and simplicity of design
Sept. 2006
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Benefits of MAS
Decreasing communication
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Sept. 2006
Low
Medium
High
KQML)
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Sept. 2006
Cooperative
Agents designed by interdependent designers Agents act for increased good of the system (i.e. MAS) Concerned with increasing the systems performance and not the individual agents
Self-interested
Agents designed by independent designer Agents have their own agenda and motivation Concerned with the benefit of each agent (individualistic) The latter more realistic in an Internet-setting?
Sept. 2006
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Cooperation
Both has a common object Each have different objects which are contradictory. Each have different objects which are conflictive, but the total system has one explicit (or implicit) object
Competitive
Semi-competitive
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Sept. 2006
Distributed AI perspectives
Distributed AI
Perspectives
Agent
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aches
T he or y
Gr ou p
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Ar
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R ea ct
iv e
t hi
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tu
Des ign
D el ib
e er at iv
La
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H yb
ri d
Coop erat ion
tion dina Coor
eds Testb
Methods
s si ly a An
De si gn
n io at i t go Ne
ns io at c i pl Ap
s ol To
Planning
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Sept. 2006
Self-form, self-evolve
..
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Sept. 2006
Conclusions of lecture
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Sept. 2006
Coursework
1. Give other examples of agents (not necessarily intelligent) that you know of. For each, define as precisely as possible: (a). the environment that the agent occupies, the states that this environment can be in, and the type of environment. (b). The action repertoire available to the agent, and any pre-conditions associated with these actions; (c). The goal, or design objectives of the agent what it is intended to achieve.
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Sept. 2006
Coursework
2. If a traffic light (together with its control system) is considered as intelligent agent, which of agents properties should be employ? Illustrate your answer by examples.
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Sept. 2006
Coursework
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Sept. 2006