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Developer Operations and Engineering Multi-agent Systems

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Engineering Multi-Agent Systems (EMAS 2021)

Part of the book series: Lecture Notes in Computer Science ((LNAI,volume 13190))

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Abstract

In this paper, we propose the integration of approaches to Engineering Multi-Agent Systems (EMAS) with the Developer Operations (DevOps) industry best practice. Whilst DevOps facilitates the organizational autonomy of software teams, as well as the technological automation of testing, deployment, and operations pipelines, EMAS and the agent-oriented programming paradigm help instill autonomy into software artifacts. We discuss the benefits of integrating DevOps and EMAS, for example by highlighting the need for agent-oriented abstractions for quality assurance and test automation approaches. More generally, we introduce an agent-oriented perspective on the DevOps life-cycle and list a range of research challenges that are relevant for the integration of the DevOps and EMAS perspectives.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    We observe that Knight Capital’s system is one of numerous autonomous software systems already in operation within socio-technically complex organizations [15].

  2. 2.

    For an overview of some agent-oriented programming languages and frameworks, see (for example) Cardoso and Ferrando [12].

  3. 3.

    We assume that these tests can be executed relatively quickly when the developer logs a change, which is – in the case of standard approaches to static code analysis (often called linting), unit tests, and some integration tests like micro-service handler tests – a common capability of development tool-chains.

  4. 4.

    In Vehicle-in-the-loop (VEHIL) simulations, domain-specific concepts similar to the sandbox for real-time collaboration and the cross-organizational staging system are employed.

  5. 5.

    In his Agent Programming Manifesto, Logan calls for modular approaches to AOP [26]. We argue that the notion of a minimally viable abstraction goes a step further, as it suggests a focus on one particular benefit AOP can bring to mainstream software engineering approaches such as DevOps, and hence a radical simplification that may deliberately disregard many aspects of AOP to minimize technology overhead and learning curve when introducing a single abstraction.

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Acknowledgments

We thank the anonymous reviewers for their thoughtful and useful feedback. This work was partially supported by the Wallenberg AI, Autonomous Systems and Software Program (WASP) funded by the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation and partially funded by Project AG-BR of Petrobras and by the program PrInt CAPES-UFSC “Automação 4.0”.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Umeå University, Umeå, Sweden

    Timotheus Kampik

  2. Federal Institute of Santa Catarina, Florianópolis, SC, Brazil

    Cleber Jorge Amaral

  3. Federal University of Santa Catarina, São José, SC, Brazil

    Cleber Jorge Amaral & Jomi Fred Hübner

Authors
  1. Timotheus Kampik
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  2. Cleber Jorge Amaral
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  3. Jomi Fred Hübner
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Timotheus Kampik .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Natasha Alechina

  2. University of Turin, Turin, Italy

    Matteo Baldoni

  3. Utrecht University, Utrecht, The Netherlands

    Brian Logan

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Kampik, T., Amaral, C.J., Hübner, J.F. (2022). Developer Operations and Engineering Multi-agent Systems. In: Alechina, N., Baldoni, M., Logan, B. (eds) Engineering Multi-Agent Systems. EMAS 2021. Lecture Notes in Computer Science(), vol 13190. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-97457-2_10

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-97457-2_10

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