Engineering Mobile-Agent Applications via Context-Dependent Coordination

: The design and development of Internet applications, requiring dynamic and possibly mobile access to Internet resources, can take advantage of an approach based on autonomous mobile agents. However, mobility introduces peculiar issues related to the modeling and management of the agents’ coordination activities. This paper introduces context-dependent coordination as a framework for the design and development of Internet applications based on mobile agents, and shows how it can be supported by a proper coordination infrastructure. Context-dependent coordination is centered on the f programmable coordination media, as the software abstraction via which an agent, in an Internet site, can access to local resources and coordinate with local agents. Programmability stems from the fact that the behavior of the media can be fully configured to influence agents’ coordination activities. This enables local administrators to configure coordination media so as to enact site-dependent coordi...

• Type: Conference
• Year: 2001
• Where: ICSE
• Authors: Giacomo Cabri, Letizia Leonardi, Franco Zambonelli
• Keywords: Context-dependent Coordination, Coordination Media, ICSE 2001, Mobile Agents, Software Engineering