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Agent Interactions

Figure 3 shows some of the kinds of message passing and communications that are possible between agents. The figure shows a variety of different intercations among the agents and the client and server. For example, client 1, perhaps at the request of the user, activates agent A, which in turn carries out some interaction with the server on behalf of the user. It might entail some detailed database query that would take some time and require multiple levels of queries dependent upon initial query results. When done, the agent would report back to the user. Agent B, loosely attached to client 1, may be seen to be taking some form of independent action that involves a B agent attached to client 2. An example of this might be a standing directive from the user to contact certain kinds of users. When agent B notes that such a user is accessible, it makes contact and after negotiation with client 2's agent B, contact is made with user 2. Similarly, server agent D is shown passing information on to the D agents of all clients.

  
Figure 3: Possible InterAgent Communications Paths



Michael Spring
Mon Dec 16 14:39:59 EST 1996