Data processing: structural design – modeling – simulation – and em – Emulation – Of instruction
Reexamination Certificate
1997-02-21
2001-09-04
Teska, Kevin J. (Department: 2123)
Data processing: structural design, modeling, simulation, and em
Emulation
Of instruction
C703S027000, C707S793000, C709S202000
Reexamination Certificate
active
06285977
ABSTRACT:
BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION
1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to a multi-agents cooperating method and a system which is capable of readily describing a distributed application for providing services by cooperatively performing a plurality of applications and processes in a distributing environment composed of a plurality of computers mutually connected via a network.
2. Description of a Prior Art
An agent which is an entity of computing process such as a plurality of processes for performing a computing process on a distributed environment composed of a plurality of computers mutually connected via a network provides services in response to a request for service from a certain user or other agent.
FIG. 19
of the accompanying drawings is a block diagram of a conventional multi-agents cooperating system disclosed, for example, in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. Hei 4-77827 and Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. Hei 4-279935. In
FIG. 19
, an agent providing a variety of services comprises a communicating section
102
for communicating information with an other agent, a communicating definition storing section
103
which is a data base storing definitions for determining contents of information to be communicated, procedure of communication and target of communication, communicating target determining and communicating section
104
for determining contents of information to be communicated, procedure of communication and target of communication by referring to the contents of the communicating definitions storing section
103
, a rule base storing definitions of manner of plan or planning, and contents of the services, and a planning and service executing section
106
for providing planning and service referring to the contents of the rule base
105
.
An operation of the conventional system will now be described with reference to the drawings.
FIG. 20
is a flow diagram showing a total summary of the conventional system. As shown in
FIG. 20
, the process in the conventional system comprises a step
201
for determining if the ordered service is accepted to execute, a step
202
for determining if the order is really entrusted or not, and a step
203
for performing requested services.
In step
201
, the agent
101
estimates contents (specification) of services requested by the other agent or user and decides, if it is acceptable, to execute processing to provide the requested services. If the agent
101
desires to accept the request, it inquires conditions for the acceptance to the other agent or user. In step
202
, the other agent or user estimates the conditions to accept the request returned from the agent with its particular criterion so as to determine if it actually entrusts the execution of the services. In step
203
, the agent
101
executes services having been entrusted thereto.
FIG. 21
is a detailed flow diagram of step
201
for determining if it accepts requests to execute the requested services. The step
201
for determining if it accepts requests to execute the requested services comprises a step
204
for receiving specification of the service requested by the other agent or user by the agent
101
, a step
205
for estimating the specification of the requested service having been received in step
204
by the agent
101
, a step
206
for determining if the agent
101
desires to accept the request on the basis of the estimated result in step
205
, and a step
207
for transmitting reply of desiring to accept the request when the agent
101
has decided to accept the request in step
206
.
In step
204
, the agent
101
receives specification of services to be executed by the communicating section
102
from the other agent or user. In step
205
, the agent
101
estimates a variety of restricting conditions for executing the services by the transmitting target and communicating section
104
in accordance with the procedure and restrictions of communication defined in the communicating definition storing section
103
, refers to the rule base
105
in the planning and service executing section
106
, and estimates the probability of executing the service by trying to produce a plan for executing the specification of the service. In step
206
, the agent
101
judges if it accepts the request to perform the service on the basis of the estimated result in step
205
. As a result of the judgment, if it does not accept it, the operation terminates. In the case of accepting the request, the agent
101
transmits the conditions for executing the service to the other agent or user through the communicating section
102
in step
207
.
FIG. 22
is a detailed flow diagram of step
203
for executing the service having been entrusted in FIG.
20
. Step
203
for executing the entrusted service comprises step
208
for receiving messages representing to entrust the service, step
209
for entrusting partial service after communicating with an other agent if necessary for executing the entrusted service, and step
210
for executing partial service by the agent
101
.
In step
208
, the agent
101
receives service-entrusting information from the other agent or user having decided to entrust the service in step
202
through the communicating section
102
. In step
209
, the agent
101
, for executing the plan produced in the planning and service executing section
106
for executing the service, its transmitting target determining and communicating section
104
communicates through the communicating section
102
in accordance with the procedures and restrictions which are defined in the communicating definition storing section
103
with the other agent capable of executing a part of the plan when required. In step
210
, the service which can be processed by the agent
101
itself is executed in the planning and service executing section
106
.
FIG. 23
is a block diagram of a conventional multi-agent cooperating system disclosed for example in Japanese Patent Laid-Open No. Hei 3-84652. In
FIG. 23
, the multi-agent cooperating system comprises a plurality of agents
111
for providing a variety of services, a user information administering section
112
for storing information from users, and a common memory
113
for communicating information among the user, agent
111
and the user information administering section
112
which use the multi-agent cooperating system.
The operation of the conventional system will now be described with reference to FIG.
23
. When the user inputs a certain request to the common memory
113
, any agent
111
estimates the request by referring to the contents of the user information administering section
112
. When the agent
111
judges to be able to process the request, the processed result of the service held by the agent
111
is written into the common memory
113
. If any competition arises due to a plurality of agents
111
trying to provide services, the competition would be resolved by eventually selecting a single service result among the competed services.
According to the conventional cooperating system and method shown in
FIG. 19
, however, definitions on the planning and resource division are mixedly stored in the same agent and are not processed by clearly distinguished steps. As a result, the definitions of the agent and the whole system would be complicated, and the coverage of the processing section would become difficult.
In the conventional system, it has been necessary to describe the relationship to the other agent at the portions related to the plan and communication in all of the agents. This would break the independency of the definitions of the agent, such that the extent of the system would be reduced.
Further, in the conventional system, the definitions of the cooperating operations are relative to the communicating procedure and communicating target, so as to distribute the cooperating manner to a plurality of agents. As a result, the change of the agent organization and the cooperation would be more difficult.
Since the conventional system has been composed of agents having d
Mitsubishi Denki & Kabushiki Kaisha
Phan Thai
Teska Kevin J.
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