Organization-based Multiagent Systems Engineering Methodology

The goal of the Organization-based Multiagent System Engineering (O-MaSE) Framework is to allow the designers to construct custom agent-oriented methodologies based on a set of method fragments, all of which are based on a common metamodel. To achieve this, O-MaSE is defined by

• a metamodel,
• a set of method fragments, and
• a set of guidelines.

The O-MaSE metamodel defines a set of analysis, design, and implementation concepts and a set of constraints between them. The method fragments define how a set of analysis and design products may be created and used within the framework. Finally, guidelines define how the method fragment may be combined to create a complete instance of the O-MaSE methodology.

O-MaSE is derived from the Multiagent Systems Engineering methodology first proposed by Dr. DeLoach in 1999. MaSE was originally designed to develop general-purpose multiagent systems and has been used to design systems ranging from computer virus immune systems to
cooperative robotics systems. While MaSE provided many advantages for building multiagent systems, it was not perfect. Specific problems with the original MaSE included:

• MaSE fails to provide a mechanism for modeling multiagent system interactions with the environment.
• MaSE also tends to produce multiagent systems with a fixed organization. A multiagent team should be able to design its own organization at runtime. While MaSE already incorporates many of the required organizational concepts such as goals, roles and the relations between these entities, it cannot currently be used to define a true multiagent organization.
• MaSE does not allow the integration of sub-teams into a multiagent system. MaSE multiagent systems are assumed to have only a single layer to which all agents belong. Adding the notion of sub-teams would allow the decomposition of multiagent systems and provide for greater levels of abstraction.
• The MaSE notion of conversations was bothersome, as it tended to decompose the protocols defined in the analysis phase into small, often extremely simple pieces. When the original protocol involves more than two agents, it often results in conversations with only a single message. This makes comprehending how the individual conversations fit together more difficult.
• The MaSE process was rigid and did not allow users to skip steps or to pick and choose the parts of the methodology that were of interest to them. This was encoded in the original version of agentTool, which enforced MaSE's rigid structure.

Details on the current version of agentTool III (aT3), which supports O-MaSE can be found at the agentTool III webpage - http://agentTool.cs.ksu.edu/.

Related O-MaSE Publications

Scott A. DeLoach.O-MaSE: an extensible methodology for multi­agent systems. in Onn Shehory and Arnon Sturm (eds.) Agent-Oriented Software Engineering: Reflections on Architectures, Methodologies, Languages, and Frameworks, Springer. ISBN: 978-3-642-54431-6.

Scott A. DeLoach and Juan C. Garcia-Ojeda. The O-MaSE Methodology. In M. Cossentino et al. (eds.), Handbook on Agent-Oriented Design Processes, Springer-Verlag, Berlin Heidelberg, pp. 253-285. ISBN 978-3-642-39974-9.

Sz. Wilk, W. Michalowski, D. O'Sullivan, K. Farion, J. Sayyad-Shirabad, C. Kuziemsky, B. Kukawka. A Task-based Support Architecture for Developing Point-of-care Clinical Decision Support Systems for the Emergency Department. Methods of Information in Medicine, vol. 52, no. 1, 2013, 18-32.

Jelber Sayyad Shirabad, Szymon Wilk, Wojtek Michalowski, and Ken Farion. 2012. Implementing an Integrative Multi-agent Clinical Decision Support System with Open Source Software. J. Med. Syst. 36, 1 (February 2012), 123-137.

Scott A. DeLoach & Juan Carlos Garcia-Ojeda. O-MaSE: a customizable approach to designing and building complex, adaptive multiagent systems. International Journal of Agent-Oriented Software Engineering. Volume 4, no. 3, 2010, pp. 244 - 280.

Juan C. Garca-Ojeda and Scott A. DeLoach.The O-MaSE Process: a Standard View. Proceedings of the IEEE FIPA Workshop on Design Process Documentation and Fragmentation (FIPA DPDF), held in conjunction with The Multi-Agent Logics, Languages, and Organisations Federated Workshops (MALLOW 2010). August 30 - September 2, 2010. Lyon, France.

Juan C. Garcia-Ojeda, Scott A. DeLoach, and Robby. agentTool Process Editor: Supporting the Design of Tailored Agent-based Processes. Proceedings of the 24th Annual ACM Symposium on Applied Computing to be held at the Hilton Hawaiian Village Beach Resort & Spa Waikiki Beach, Honolulu, Hawaii, USA. March 8 - 12, 2009.

Szymon Wilk, Wojtek Michalowski, Dympna O’Sullivan, Ken Farion, and Stan Matwin. Engineering of a Clinical Decision Support Framework for the Point of Care Use. American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA) Annual Symposium Proceedings 2008; 2008: 814–818.

Scott DeLoach, Lin Padgham, Anna Perini, Angelo Susi, and John Thangarajah. Using Three AOSE Toolkits to Develop a Sample Design. International Journal of Agent Oriented Software Engineering. Volume 3, no. 4, 2009, 2009, pp 416-476.

Scott A. DeLoach. Organizational Model for Adaptive Complex Systems. in Virginia Dignum (ed.) Multi-Agent Systems: Semantics and Dynamics of Organizational Models. IGI Global: Hershey, PA. ISBN: 1-60566-256-9 (March 2009). This chapter copyright 2008, IGI Global, www.igi-pub.com. Posted by permission of the publisher.

Juan C. Garcia-Ojeda, Scott A. DeLoach, and Robby. agentTool Process Editor: Supporting the Design of Tailored Agent-based Processes. Proceedings of the 24th Annual ACM Symposium on Applied Computing to be held at the Hilton Hawaiian Village Beach Resort & Spa Waikiki Beach, Honolulu, Hawaii, USA. March 8 - 12, 2009.

Lin Padgham, Michael Winikoff, Scott DeLoach, and Massimo Cossentino. A Unified Graphical Notation for AOSE. Proceedings of the 9th International Workshop on Agent Oriented Software Engineering, Estoril Portugal, May 2008.

Scott A. DeLoach. Developing a Multiagent Conference Management System Using the O-MaSE Process Framework. Proceedings of the 8th International Workshop on Agent Oriented Software Engineering, May 14, 2007, Honolulu, Hawaii. (invited)

Juan C. Garcia-Ojeda, Scott A. DeLoach, Robby, Walamitien H. Oyenan and Jorge Valenzuela. O-MaSE: A Customizable Approach to Developing Multiagent Development Processes. Proceedings of the 8th International Workshop on Agent Oriented Software Engineering, Honolulu HI, May 2007.

Scott A. DeLoach and Jorge L. Valenzuela. An Agent-Environment Interaction Model. in L. Padgham and F. Zambonelli (Eds.): AOSE 2006, LNCS 4405, pp. 1-18, 2007. Springer-Verlag, Berlin Heidelberg 2007.

Scott A. DeLoach. Multiagent Systems Engineering of Organization-based Multiagent Systems. 4th International Workshop on Software Engineering for Large-Scale Multi-Agent Systems (SELMAS'05). May 15-16, 2005, St. Louis, MO. Springer LNCS Vol 3914, Apr 2006, pp 109 - 125.

MaSE Publications

Scott A. DeLoach, Mark F. Wood and Clint H. Sparkman, Multiagent Systems Engineering, The International Journal of Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering, Volume 11 no. 3, June 2001.

Scott A. DeLoach & Madhukar Kumar. Multiagent Systems Engineering: a Case Study. In Agent-Oriented Methodologies. Brian Henderson-Sellers and Paolo Giorgini (eds). Idea Group, 2005.

Scott A. DeLoach. The MaSE Methodology. In Methodologies and Software Engineering for Agent Systems. The Agent-Oriented Software Engineering Handbook Series : Multiagent Systems, Artificial Societies, and Simulated Organizations, Vol. 11. Bergenti, Federico; Gleizes, Marie-Pierre; Zambonelli, Franco (Eds.) Kluwer Academic Publishing (available via Springer), August 2004.

Scott A. DeLoach, Eric T. Matson, Yonghua Li. Exploiting Agent Oriented Software Engineering in the Design of a Cooperative Robotics Search and Rescue System. The International Journal of Pattern Recognition and Artificial Intelligence, 17 (5) August 2003.

Scott A. DeLoach, Specifying Agent Behavior as Concurrent Tasks: Defining the Behavior of Social Agents. Proceedings of the Fifth Annual Conference on Autonomous Agents, Montreal Canada, May 28 - June 1, 2001.

Scott A. DeLoach. Analysis and Design using MaSE and agentTool, Proceedings of the 12th Midwest Artificial Intelligence and Cognitive Science Conference (MAICS 2001). Miami University, Oxford, Ohio, March 31 - April 1, 2001.

Scott A. DeLoach, Specifying Agent Behavior as Concurrent Tasks: Defining the Behavior of Social Agents. Technical Report, Air Force Institute of Technology, AFIT/EN-TR-00-03, July 2000.

Scott A. DeLoach & Mark Wood, Multiagent Systems Engineering: the Analysis Phase. Technical Report, Air Force Institute of Technology, AFIT/EN-TR-00-02, June 2000.

Wood, Mark & Scott A. DeLoach, An Overview of the Multiagent Systems Engineering Methodology. The First International Workshop on Agent-Oriented Software Engineering (AOSE-2000), June 10, 2000 - Limerick, Ireland

DeLoach, Scott A. Multiagent Systems Engineering: A Methodology and Language for Designing Agent Systems, Agent-Oriented Information Systems '99 (AOIS'99), Seattle WA, 1 May 1998.

Sponsors

This research has been sponsored by the Air Force Office of Scientific Research (AFOSR) and the National Science Foundation (NSF).