Abstract
We propose a simple event calculus representation of contracts and a reactive belief-desire-intention agent architecture to enable the monitoring and execution of contract terms and conditions. We use the event calculus to deduce current and past obligations, obligation fulfilment and violation. By associating meta-information with the contracts, the agent is able to select which of its contracts with other agents are relevant to solving its goals by outsourcing. The agent is able to handle an extendable set of contract types such as standing contracts, purchase contracts and service contracts without the need for a first-principles planner.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsPreview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Alberti, M., Daolio, D., Torroni, P., Gavanelli, M., Lamma, E., Mello, P.: Specification and verification of agent interaction protocols in a logic-based system. In: SAC 2004: Proceedings of the 2004 ACM symposium on Applied computing, pp. 72–78. ACM Press, New York (2004)
Alberti, M., Gavanelli, M., Lamma, E., Mello, P., Torroni, P.: Specification and verification of agent interactions using social integrity constraints. In: van der Hoek, W., Lomuscio, A., de Vink, E., Wooldridge, M. (eds.) Workshop on Logic and Communication in Multi-Agent Systems (LCMAS 2003), Eindhoven, Netherlands. Electronic Notes in Theoretical Computer Science, vol. 85. Elsevier, Amsterdam (June 2003)
Artikis, A., Pitt, J., Sergot, M.: Animated specifications of computational societies. In: Castelfranchi, C., Johnson, L. (eds.) Proceedings of Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems (AAMAS 2002), pp. 1053–1062. ACM Press, New York (2002)
Bandara, A.K., Lupu, E.C., Russo, A.: Using event calculus to formalise policy specification and analysis. In: Proceedings of the 4th IEEE International Workshop on Policies for Distributed Systems and Networks, p. 26. IEEE Computer Society, Los Alamitos (2003)
Bordini, R.H., Hübner, J.F.: Jason - A Java-based agentSpeak intepreter used with saci for multi-agent distribution over the net (2005), http://jason.sourceforge.net
Broersen, J.M., Dastani, M., Hulstijn, J., Huang, Z., van der Torre, L.W.N.: The BOID architecture: conflicts between beliefs, obligations, intentions and desires. In: Proceedings of the Fifth International Conference on Autonomous Agents, pp. 9–16. ACM Press, New York (2001)
Clark, K.L., McCabe, F.G.: Go! – a Multi-paradigm programming language for implementing Multi-threaded agents. Annals of Mathematics and Artificial Intelligence 41(2-4), 171–206 (2004)
Dignum, F.P.M., Broersen, J.M., Dignum, V., Meyer, J.-J.C.: Meeting the deadline: Why, when and how. In: Hinchey, M.G., Rash, J.L., Truszkowski, W.F., Rouff, C.A. (eds.) FAABS 2004. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 3228, pp. 30–40. Springer, Heidelberg (2004)
Dignum, V., Meyer, J.-J.C., Dignum, F.P.M., Weigand, H.: Formal specification of interaction in agent societies. In: Hinchey, M.G., Rash, J.L., Truszkowski, W.F., Rouff, C.A., Gordon-Spears, D.F. (eds.) FAABS 2002. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 2699, Springer, Heidelberg (2003)
Kollingbaum, M.J., Norman, T.J.: Supervised interaction: creating a web of trust for contracting agents in electronic environments. In: Proceedings of the First International Joint Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems, pp. 272–279. ACM Press, New York (2002)
Kollingbaum, M.J., Norman, T.J.: Norm consistency in practical reasoning agents. In: Proceedings of PROMAS Workshop on Programming Multiagent Systems, AAMAS 2003 (2003)
Kowalski, R.A., Sergot, M.J.: A logic-based calculus of events. New Generation Computing 4(4), 319–340 (1986)
Rao, A.S.: AgentSpeak(L): BDI agents speak out in a logical computable language. In: Perram, J., Van de Velde, W. (eds.) MAAMAW 1996. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 1038, pp. 42–55. Springer, Heidelberg (1996)
Shanahan, M.: The event calculus explained. In: Veloso, M.M., Wooldridge, M.J. (eds.) Artificial Intelligence Today. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 1600, pp. 409–430. Springer, Heidelberg (1999)
Shoham, Y.: Agent0: A simple agent language and its interpreter. In: Proceedings of AAAI 1991, Anaheim, CA, pp. 704–709 (1991)
Verharen, E.M., Dignum, F.P.M.: Cooperative Information Agents and communication. In: Kandzia, P., Klusch, M. (eds.) CIA 1997. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 1202, pp. 195–209. Springer, Heidelberg (1997)
Verharen, E.M., Dignum, F.P.M., Bos, S.: Implementation of a cooperative agent architecture based on the language-action perspective. In: Rao, A., Singh, M.P., Wooldridge, M.J. (eds.) ATAL 1997. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 1365, pp. 31–44. Springer, Heidelberg (1998)
Winikoff, M.: An agentspeak meta-interpreter and its applications. In: Bordini, R.H., Dastani, M.M., Dix, J., El Fallah Seghrouchni, A. (eds.) PROMAS 2005. LNCS (LNAI), vol. 3862, pp. 123–138. Springer, Heidelberg (2006)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Editors and Affiliations
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2006 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Knottenbelt, J., Clark, K. (2006). Contract-Related Agents. In: Toni, F., Torroni, P. (eds) Computational Logic in Multi-Agent Systems. CLIMA 2005. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 3900. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/11750734_13
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/11750734_13
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-33996-0
Online ISBN: 978-3-540-33997-7
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)