Engineering multi-agent systems through statecharts-based JADE agents and tools

  • Authors:

  • Giancarlo Fortino;Francesco Rango;Wilma Russo

  • Affiliations:

  • Dept. of Electronics, Informatics and Systems (DEIS), University of Calabria, Rende, CS, Italy;Dept. of Electronics, Informatics and Systems (DEIS), University of Calabria, Rende, CS, Italy;Dept. of Electronics, Informatics and Systems (DEIS), University of Calabria, Rende, CS, Italy

  • Venue:
  • Transactions on Computational Collective Intelligence VII
  • Year:
  • 2012

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Abstract

The JADE framework, which is one of the most used in the AOSE community to program and execute multi-agent systems (MASs), still needs to be further supported by methods and tools for enabling a more effective modeling and prototyping of JADE-based MASs. In this paper we propose a framework and a related tool supporting a Statecharts-based development of JADE-based MAS with the purpose of providing an effective approach for engineering multi-agent systems and leveraging agent-oriented development methodologies and processes adopting JADE as target agent platform. In particular, a framework for programming JADE behaviors through a variant of the Statecharts, named Distilled StateCharts (DSCs), has been first developed by enhancing the JADE add-on HSMBehaviour. Then, to enable rapid prototyping of JADE agents, a visual tool for DSCs has been extended with translation rules based on the developed framework that allows to automatically translate DSC specifications into DSC-based JADE behaviors. The proposed approach is exemplified through a case study concerning an agent-based meeting organization system.