Agent-based approaches to managing fault-tolerant networks of distributed multi-agent systems¹

Issue title: Agent Based Computing: From Model to Implementation

Guest editors: Maria Ganzhaw, Marcin Paprzyckix, Costin Badicay and Rainer Unlandz

Article type: Research Article

Authors: Mitrović, Dejan^{a; *} | Budimac, Zoran^a | Ivanović, Mirjana^a | Vidaković, Milan^b

Affiliations: [a] Department of Mathematics and Informatics, Faculty of Sciences, University of Novi Sad, Novi Sad, Serbia | [b] Faculty of Technical Sciences, University of Novi Sad, Novi Sad, Serbia | [w] Systems Research Institute, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw and University of Gdansk, Warsaw, Poland | [x] Systems Research Institute, Polish Academy of Sciences, Warsaw and Management Academy, Warsaw, Poland | [y] Software Engineering Department, Faculty of Automatics, Computers and Electronics, University of Craiova, Bvd.Decebal, Craiova, Romania | [z] University of Duisburg-Essen, Institute for Computer Science and Business Information Systems (ICB), Practical Computer Science, Data Management Systems and Knowledge Representation, Essen, Germany

Correspondence: [*] Corresponding author. Tel.: +381 21 485 2875; Fax: +381 21 6 350 458; E-mail: dejan@dmi.uns.ac.rs

Note: [1] The work is partially supported by Ministry of Education and Science of the Republic of Serbia, through project no. OI174023: “Intelligent techniques and their integration into wide-spectrum decision support”.

Abstract: Large-scale agent-based software solutions need to be able to assure constant delivery of services to end-users, regardless of the underlying software or hardware failures. Fault-tolerance of multi-agent systems is, therefore, an important issue. We present two algorithms for an easy and flexible introduction of fault-tolerance to existing agent frameworks. The first algorithm is based on a new type of mobile agent, named Connection Agent, for efficient construction and maintenance of fault-tolerant multi-agent system networks. The algorithm has been experimentally verified, and then significantly optimized by relying on the mobility feature of Connection Agents. Secondly, a robust agent tracking technique based on a special type of agent, named RemnantAgent, is proposed.

Keywords: Mobile agents, MAS fault-tolerance, network management, agent tracking

DOI: 10.3233/MGS-2011-0176

Journal: Multiagent and Grid Systems , vol. 7, no. 6, pp. 203-218, 2011