The Aglets project

Abstract

When the Java programming language became available in 1995, Tokyo Research Laboratory of IBM Corp. decided to create a new system for mobile agents through a project called Aglets that would operate comfortably in the open system world of Java and the Internet. It was designed by referring to Java's applet and event delegation model, so Java programmers could learn and use it easily to take advantage of mobile agents. An Aglet is a composite Java object that includes mobility and persistence and its own thread of execution and can communicate with other Aglets. It also has its own credentials to indicate who implemented and instantiated it. Based on these credentials, a receiving computer can limit the behavior of incoming Aglets. Using Aglets, a programmer can readily implement autonomous objects in a distributed computing environment. Aglet is rendered through a programming style involving a call-back model based on the Java event delegation model. Each event gives an Aglet the opportunity to determine how to react.