An Overview of Software Agent-Oriented Frameworks

Abstract

The main goal of this paper is to present the structural and functional characteristics of software agent-oriented frameworks. Such a framework is an environment composed of a supervisor program and one or several teams of software agents that fulfill services offered by this framework to users and to other frameworks. To illustrate an application of these software agent-oriented frameworks, the paper describes their use in the context of the SIGAL project that aims at designing an interoperable environment for georeferenced digital libraries. Categories and Subject Descriptors: [Systems Interoperability]: Distribution, Heterogeneity; [Software Agents]. © 2000, ACM. All rights reserved.