Mixing electronic institutions with virtual organizations: A solution based on bundles

Abstract

Today, software development largely consists of adapting existing functionality to perform in a new environment. In reality, integrating existing code has become a large part of the work of software developers. Looking at the different possibilities of representing human societies, the need for this integration is even higher. The societies between human beings are heterogeneus and the existing software approaches to them, do not cover all their aspects completely. If we want to translate a static organization (f.i. the Congress), from physical to electronic world, we use Electronic Institutions. In case we want to translate a dynamic organization (f.i. a fan club), we use Virtual Organizations. But, what if our organization to translate is a hybrid system where we can find features of both approaches (static and dynamic)? This paper investigates how the Electronic Institutions (EI) and the Virtual Organizations (VO) may be integrated, in a dynamic environment, to supply a solution for these hybrid scenarios. © 2011 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.