Nonmonotonic Commitment Machines

CHOPRA, AMIT KHUSHWANT. Nonmonotonic Commitment Machines. (Under the direction of Dr. Munindar P. Singh). Protocols in open and dynamic multiagent systems cannot be modeled via formalisms such as finite state machines (FSMs). FSMs though formal, lack content, that is, a protocollevel semantics, which leads to rigidity in protocols. We propose formalism called Nonmonotonic Commitment Machines (NCMs) for representing protocols. An NCM gives a commitment-based semantics to actions and states in a protocol. Protocols represented as NCMs afford the agent flexibility in interactions with other agents. In particular, situations in protocols when nonmonotonic reasoning is required can be efficiently represented in NCMs. For applications that need efficient execution, we show how to compile an NCM into an FSM and prove the compilation to be sound and complete. 

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2003
• Where: AGENTCL
• Authors: Amit K. Chopra, Munindar P. Singh
• Keywords: AGENTCL 2003, Communications, Dynamic Multiagent Systems, Nonmonotonic Commitment Machines, finite State Machines