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Made by :

Priyanka Dhawan

35/MBA/09


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AGENTThe term "agent" describes a software abstraction, anidea, or a concept, similar to OOP terms such as

methods, functions, and objects.

The concept of an agent provides a convenient andpowerful way to describe a complex software entity thatis capable of acting with a certain degree of autonomy inorder to accomplish tasks on behalf of its user.


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Characteristics of Agent are as follows:

Persistence (code is not executed on demand but runscontinuously and decides for itself when it should performsome activity)

Autonomy (agents have capabilities of task selection,prioritization, goal-directed behaviour, decision-makingwithout human intervention)

Social ability (agents are able to engage other components

through some sort of communication and coordination, theymay collaborate on a task)

Reactivity (agents perceive the context in which they

operate and react to it appropriately).


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Types of AgentsStationary Agent

A stationary agent can be seen as a piece of autonomous (or semi-autonomous) software that permanently resides on a particular host.

Such an agent performs tasks on its host machine such as accepting mobileagents, allocating resources, performing specific computing tasks, enforcingsecurity policies and so forth.

Mobile Agent

A mobile agent is a software agent that has the ability to transport itself fromone host to another in a network.

The ability to travel allows a mobile agent to move itself to a host thatcontains an object with which the agent wants to interact, and then to take

advantage of the computing resources of the objects host in order to interactwith that object.


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Messaging agent: an agent responsible for transporting messages between

different agent teams.A messaging agent has strong collaborativecharacteristics and is by nature a mobile agent since the different agentteams may function in a distributed environment.

Task agent: an agent that supports a specific project task. This agentcollaborates with other objective and facilitator functions to support aspecific task. Such an agent is commonly invoked by a PA agent to allow astakeholder to work on a specific task, and is continuously monitored by amonitoring agent.

Monitoring agent: an agent responsible for monitoring tasks. A

monitoring agent is mobile, with intelligence, flexibility and strongcollaborative properties.

Team manager agent: an agent that is responsible for managing a team ofagents, ensuring coordination between the sub-tasks of the differentmembers of a team to accomplish the objective of the agent team.


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Amulti-agent system (MAS) is a system composed of multipleinteracting intelligent agents. Multi-agent systems can be used tosolve problems which are difficult or impossible for an individualagent or monolithic system to solve.

Multi-Agent system (

MAS)

The agents in a multi-agent system have several importantcharacteristics:

Autonomy: the agents are at least partially autonomous.

Local views: no agent has a full global view of the system, or thesystem is too complex for an agent to make practical use of suchknowledge.

Decentralization: there is no designated controlling agent (or thesystem is effectively reduced to a monolithic system).


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Advantagesy Agents overcome network latency by executing locally thereby

reducing network load as they allow distribution and communicationover a geographic area irrespective of its location.

y They can incorporate large network systems and mobile devices.Taskscan be embedded into mobile agents which can traverse the networkand work asynchronously and autonomously without relying oncontinued operation.

y Agents support the distributed retrieval and dissemination informationand documents.

y Teams of agents can coordinate actions towards a common goal in a

distributed environment.


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Agents are used for project planning and process management in a distributedenvironment.

They are used to control and monitor activity execution at various sites in an open

source platform supporting distributed software engineering processes.

Agents are mainly utilised for the synchronisation of process instances executed ondifferent sites, the dynamic reconfiguration of software processes, process datacollection, monitoring of the processes, as well as artefact retrieval.

Agent technology has been more commonly applied to areas such as network andsystem management decision and logic support data collection in distributed andheterogenous environments, searching and filtering, negotiating, and monitoring.

APPLICATIONS


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THE ISSUE OF SUPPORT THE SOFTWARE

MANAGEMENT PROCESSESManaging IT projects does not only entail classic management functions,but it is more often perceived as a kind of art that most of all requires thebroad experience of managers and their abilities to optimise technologiesapplied during the realisation of such projects.

Its spoken that almost 70% of IT projects are unsuccessful due toexceeding one of the basic limitations (the schedule, budget or scope of theproject).

The problem of choosing methods to manage IT projects is becoming amore common managing dilemma.

It appears that the improper choice of methods very often causes thefailure of the project (by not fulfilling its conditions the budget, scope orschedule).


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It must be deemed that support in decision-making regarding the methods

and devices applied in the realisation of the project is a basic planning task ofthe project manager.

It is thus particularly worth focusing on the planning function, becauseit is exactly within this function that decisions regarding the furtherrealisation of the project are made.

It seems appropriate to Indicate key parameters which influence thedecision of the project manager regarding the choice of a project

management method.

It is also worth adding that there are numerous formal methods of projectmanagement (about 10 main methods, i.e. RUP, PRINCE, SCRUM, XP). Apartfrom these, we can distinguish many methods individually created bysoftware producers for their own needs (as in SAP).


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The concept of an agent system indicates a project managementmethod for managing I.T projects.

Globalisation and advances in computing technologies has changedthe software project management environment.

Currently software projects are developed and deployed in distributed,pervasive and collaborative environments.

Agents are used to support the development of SPM systems in whichdata, control, expertise, or resources are distributed.


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Model to Support the Software Project

Management


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Experiences gained during the realisation of many projects

enable the indication of three basic key variables for decision-making regarding the choice of an IT project management

method. These variables include:

a) Client maturityb) Organisation maturityc) Project entropy


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Client maturity means the levelof client preparation to participatein a project.

Increasingly, IT projectmanagement methods deal withthe clients participation and theirinfluence on the changeability ofthe project.

The necessity to modify theitineraries of the conductedprojects is usually caused by client

interference.

Client Maturity


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Depending on the level of familiarity with a projectmanagementfield, we can distinguish 4 instances of clientmaturity:

ADJUSTED AND PROPER a situation when the client is familiar withthe project management field, understands its processes and is open forcooperation. Project managers seek such client representatives.

ADJUSTED AND IM

PROPER- a situation when the client is open forcooperation but is not familiar with the project field. It is often the case thatthe client matures as the project develops.

UNADJUSTED AND PROPER a situation when the client is familiar withthe project field but is difficult in cooperation. This situation often leads to

endangering project finalisation.

UNADJUSTED AND IMPROPER a situation when the client is notfamiliar with the project management field, does not understand theconditions of the project and is barely engaged in it. This is the most

difficult scenario for a manager.


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Organisation maturityOrganisation maturity relates to theimmanent features of the teamconducting the given project. It is saidthat modern IT organisations gain

certain levels of maturity.

Depending on the maturity level, aproper project management methodshould be adjusted.

Soft methods requiring the selforganisation of work are much morerecommended for more experiencedteams (at ahigher maturity level) thanfor young inexperienced teams.


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An exemplary gradation of this parameter may be described as follows (as

in CMMI):

LEVEL 1 FUNCTIONING (processes engage the resources necessary tocreate the final result).

LEVEL 2 MANAGING (processes of such an organisation are planned

and executed according to a given policy, the realisation of the project isevaluated according to its coherency with the plan).

LEVEL 3 DEFINED (an organisation is able to obtain information onindicators relating to the final result).

LEVEL 4 QUANTITATIVELYMEASURED (processes are controlledusing statistical and quantitative techniques, the quality of products andservices and process performance are measurable and controlled for allprojects).

LEVEL 5 OPTIMISING (the organisation focuses on continuousimprovement of process performance, all processes are controlled).


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Project EntropyProject entropy is the measurement of thedisorganisation of information and thereforemeasures the uncertainty of the realisation of

developing and managing processes in the project.

It is often the case that before commencing therealisation of the project, a set of working,organisational sessions are conducted directing

work and indicating the scope of activities.

Unfortunately, it is also common that at thebeginning, the final shape of the planned solutionis not known.


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Regarding this uncertainty connected with the lack of knowledge and

lack of precise expectations or inability to obtain the possible fullscope of expectations from the client, the project should be dividedinto:

LOW ENTROPY PROJECTS small projects with their aims andbasic assumptions stated very clearly.

MEDIUM ENTROPY PROJECTS projects where the basicassumptions need to be verified a few times.

HIGH ENTROPY PROJECTS - uncertainty regarding the level ofchangeability in the project dominates; expectations towards theproject are not clearly stated.


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For the needs of implementing the management decisions of the supportsystem, hierarchy dependencies between the agents of the system wereadopted:3 main categories of agents were defined:

Intermediary agent(s) responsible for communication with the user,

Searching agent(s) responsible for searching the system resources(including communication with the expert system),

Managing agent responsible for supervising other agents.

There is possibility of using some others agents like ontology agent (tocommunicate with ontology that is one of system component) orevaluating agents. The scope of their activity is equivalent to separatefunctionalities of the system (such as obtaining information, processing,

sending results, etc.).

IMPLEMENTATION OF THE MODEL


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Depending on the of input parameters (relating to project complexity,organisation maturity and client maturity) the evaluation process isactivated by the agent system.

As a result of evaluation, the person inquiring (the user) receives an

indication of which IT project realisation method should be applied forthe needs of creating a corporate architecture.

At the first stage of system activity, the intermediary agent obtainsinformation entered by the user in the inquiry field. Such information is

transferred to the managing agent.

Based on such information, the managing agent makes a decision aboutusing the resources possessed by the system. Such a f low of activitiesresults from the adopted organisation of the system whereby agents aregathered according to their functions and hierarchy.

Working of the Agent System


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Based on the knowledge base, the managing agent analyses thereceived inquiry.

In the event of a search, the managing agent activates the searchingagent and forwards the order to search the knowledge resourcesavailable in the system (the fact base).

In the event of an inquiry requiring calculations, the managing agentactivates the particular calculating module (the expert system, neuronnet) and orders the searching agent to download the results.

After that, the results are forwarded to the managing agent. Resultsobtained through calculations are submitted to the client via theintermediary agent.


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Agents are used to support the development of SPM systems in which data,control, expertise, or resources are distributed.

Software agent technology provides a natural metaphor for support in adistributed team environment, where software agents can support the projectmanager and team members to monitor and coordinate tasks, apply quality controlmeasures, validation and verification, as well as change control.

The use of software agents is regarded as a potential tool to improve the

management of related SPM processes.

Agents support the distributed retrieval and dissemination information anddocuments.

Agent technology has the advantage of sophisticated patterns of interaction,namely cooperation, coordination and negotiation.

Conclusions


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