Compositional design and reuse of a generic agent model

Abstract

This article introduces a formally specified design of a compositional generic agent model (GAM). This agent model abstracts from specific application domains; it provides a unified formal definition of a model for weak agenthood. It can be (re) used as a template or pattern for a large variety of agent types and application-domain types. The model was designed on the basis of experiences in a number of application domains. The compositional development method DESIRE was used to design the agent model GAM at a conceptual and logical level. It serves as a unified, precisely defined, conceptual structure, which can be refined by specialization and instantiation to a large variety of other, more specific agents. To illustrate reuse of this agent model, specialization and instantiation to model cooperative information gathering agents is described in depth. Moreover, it is shown how GAM can be used to describe in a unified and, hence, more comparable manner a large number of agent architectures from the literature. © 2000 Taylor and Francis Group, LLC.