In: 06, 2006: Proceedings of the Fourth International Workshop on Modelling of Objects, Components and Agents, MOCA'06, Bericht 272, FBI-HH-B-272, pages 293-299. June 06.
Abstract: This paper describes the usage of component diagram like models for the analysis and design of dependencies in multi-agent systems. As in other software paradigms also in multi-agent-based applications there exist dependencies between offered and required services, respectively the agents that offer or require those services. In simple settings it seems superfluous to model or analyze those dependencies explicitly because they are obvious. In complex settings, however, these dependencies can grow rather confusingly big and can cause misunderstandings among the developers of the system. Here it is useful to achieve a visualization of those dependencies by analyzing the given multi-agent application and displaying these in a diagram.The diagram gives a clear illustration of the overall structure of the system and therefore forms a basis for the discussion of the architecture. In addition, the diagram may be used for the documentation of the system. A dependency diagram technique together with a tool integration is presented in this paper.
Keywords: Agents; Services; Dependencies; Component Diagrams; Modeling; RENEW; MULAN.