Activity #15
Study Interaction Languages

This activity consists in defining the way in which agents are going to interact.

If agents interact to communicate, for each scenario (defined in Activities #7 & #13), you have to describe information exchanges between agents. Technically, these protocols will be specified through protocol diagrams using the AUML notation.

This step produces the initial Interaction Languages document.

Languages that enable interactions between agents may be implemented by a set of classes or by a design pattern, including specific agent communication tools such as an implementation of FIPA ACL. As they are generic models, protocol diagrams are attached to packages and not to classes.

Note that defining an interaction language is useless if no direct communication is used by agents (for instance, if they only communicate in an indirect manner via the environment).