Re: [ebsoa] events and agents as defined in an ebSOA

["David Webber \(XML\)" <david@drrw.info>]

Richard,

Great feedback - that's exactly my thought here - there are so
many good AI agent tools out there - what we need is a
simple focused kit of XML-directed methods specifically for
ebSOA use that give clear ROI and business purpose -and
can be interoperable across a broad selection of tools.

For example I look at what BPSS V2.0 is now - and see
opportunities and areas to add discrete components to that.
And the BPSS team has already slated these for V3.0 of
BPSS consideration.   Top of my list is the "hand in the sky"
concept - where collaborating process threads can reference
a central fact repository to assert and retrieve clauses and
rules and status indicators - (eg the BCM linking and
switching approach).

This is classic Prolog-esque stuff - but its amazing what
an 80:20 approach can bring here.  And notice that this
is ROI driven.

BPSS works very well today in building a functioning
process - for large # of typical environments.  Adding this
in V3.0 will allow people to tackle another level of more
complex interaction flows, thus incrementally improving
real business systems.   What is especially attractive is
being able to deploy a base system - and then add these
extended features easily as yor needs expand.

Cheers, DW

----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Richard Manning" <Richard.Manning@Sun.COM>
To: <john@crossconnections.ws>
Cc: "David Webber (XML)" <david@drrw.info>; "Dan Pattyn"
<danpattyn@austin.rr.com>; <vasco.drecun@cpd-associates.com>; "Goran Zugic"
<gzugic@ebxmlsoft.com>; "Dale Castle" <dcastle@ebxmlsoft.com>; "ebSOA OASIS
TC" <ebsoa@lists.oasis-open.org>; <discuss@jxta.org>
Sent: Monday, May 09, 2005 7:29 PM
Subject: Re: [ebsoa] events and agents as defined in an ebSOA


> Personal Opinion:
>
> Greetings:
>
> I just caught the tail of this thread, my apologies for not reading the
> whole thread, attachments and links as yet; great to see activity in
> this area...
>
> IMHO (having done some work in this area), JXTA provides an excellent
> foundation for distributed, intelligent, mobile, multi-agent systems
> (also an instance of SOA). There is nothing preventing an agent system
> architecture/design/implementation from supporting/integrating both FIPA
> agent standards and OASIS standards. I'd also add W3C, especially the
> Semantic Web efforts namely OWL/RDF. (FIPA info, http://www.fipa.org/
> ;FIPA is now an IEEE Standards Committee, see:
> http://www.fipa.org/about/fipa_and_ieee.html)
>
> If you haven't already done so, it is worth a look at CMU's RETSINA and
> Semantic Web efforts which c/should also be of interest
> (http://www-2.cs.cmu.edu/~softagents/index.html), though I don't know
> the licensing requirements, if any. There are too many other good agent
> efforts to list, as someone previously mentioned, though there are agent
> standards such as FIPA.
>
> While there may be overlap among the many specs, these are minimal and
> can be normalized given sufficient interest (and wheel reinvention
> avoidance). Consider FIPA-compliant agents which also support OASIS /
> Web service standards and common bindings (SOAP/WSDL/UDDI/ebXML-RR/
> etc.) and W3C standards (*ML, Semantic Web, etc.) deployed over a
> FIPA/JXTA agent ecosystem.
>
> Agents as Web services and vice versa, not an original thought perhaps
> but also not a common thought. Perhaps these specs/standards may
> converge and synthesize eventually, however at present they are often
> complimentary...e.g., compare/contrast
> BPEL/BPM/Choreography/Ontology/UBL/etc with FIPA Agent Communications
> (Contract Net Interaction Protocol), Agent Management, Ontology, ACL, etc.
>
> For me, the great thing about all of this is that JXTA, FIPA, OASIS, W3C
> are open, implementation, language, platform, network neutral standards
> and/or specifications. There are commercial and open source
> implementations for various elements too. Finally, while not trivial it
> is possible to integrate and synthesize these many specs and standards
> (even implementations) to achieve what "I think" you are looking for...
>
> ..and at the top of my soapbox list co-equal with agent systems...AI,.
> but I'll spare you my pro-AI rants & raves as this isn't the appropriate
> forum ;)
>
> Regards,
> Richard
>
>
>
> ----- Original Message -----
> From: john c hardin <johnchardin@comcast.net>
> Date: Monday, May 9, 2005 3:46 pm
> Subject: Re: [ebsoa] events and agents as defined in an ebSOA
>
> > Understood David, thank you. I was suggesting that we use
> > applicable universal
> > "concepts" from the JXTA projects, not the actual implementation.
> > Obviously,
> > JXTA could be implemented as an agent framework if the implementer
> > chose to do so.
> >
> > I just wanted to make sure that we get a well-rounded picture of
> > agent concepts.
> >
> > David Webber (XML) wrote:
> > > John,
> > >
> > > The caveat I have is simple - the design of ebSOA should be
> > implementation> language
> > > neutral.
> > >
> > > That is the whole point behind the BCM linking and switching -
> > its based on
> > > classical
> > > declarative logic processing - and can be expressed as XML
> > structures - that
> > > can
> > > then be read and processed by any agent engine.
> > >
> > > There are literally 100 different agent engines out there - all
> > with their
> > > own
> > > proprietary syntan and API - (even if they are written in Java -
> > or maybe
> > > especially
> > > if they are written in Java!).
> > >
> > > What the world does not have is a common method of integrating
> > *all* these.
> > > That I believe is where traditionally OASIS can look to make a
> > significant> contribution...
> > >
> > > DW
> > >
> > > ----- Original Message ----- 
> > > From: "john c hardin" <johnchardin@comcast.net>
> > > To: <john@crossconnections.ws>
> > > Cc: "Dan Pattyn" <danpattyn@austin.rr.com>; "David RR Webber"
> > > <david@drrw.info>; <vasco.drecun@cpd-associates.com>; "Goran Zugic"
> > > <gzugic@ebxmlsoft.com>; "Dale Castle" <dcastle@ebxmlsoft.com>;
> > "ebSOA OASIS
> > > TC" <ebsoa@lists.oasis-open.org>; <richard.manning@sun.com>;
> > > <discuss@jxta.org>
> > > Sent: Monday, May 09, 2005 2:48 PM
> > > Subject: Re: [ebsoa] events and agents as defined in an ebSOA
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >>Richard Manning from Sun Microsystems presented on JXTA at the 2004
> > >
> > > Symposium.
> > >
> > >>Slides are found at:
> > >>
> > >>http://www.oasis-open.org/events/symposium/slides/manning.pdf
> > >>
> > >>john c hardin wrote:
> > >>
> > >>>I would like to start a conversation on the list re: the agent
> > >>>architecture, as proposed in the Federated Enterprise Reference
> > >>>Architecture approach.
> > >>>
> > >>>Thanks to Goran, Vasco and the ebXMLsoft team for creating the
> > >>>presentation attached, and to David Webber and Dan Pattyn for
> > pointing>>>me to the BCM material.
> > >>>
> > >>>I think that there are several inputs that we can include to
> > round out
> > >>>the ideas of a non-intrusive, event-driven agent model. Opinions
> > are>>>requested from the group on these, and preferences for how to
> > specify>>>the agent mechanisms using a combination of the
> > approaches here:
> > >>>
> > >>>- The Agent Framework is described in the attached BCM / FERA
> > >>>presentation. There is a lot of good material here, however, we
> > need to
> > >>>make sure that we are re-using stable OASIS specs where
> > possible. I
> > >>>would like to map the specifications mentioned in the
> > presentation to
> > >>>the existing specs.
> > >>>
> > >>>- The BCM Linking and Switching as a mechanism to bind to the agent
> > >>>framework
> > >>>
> > >>>- Possibly including JXTA concepts, where possible, as they
> > describe>>>peering between components and applications.
> > >>>http://www.jxta.org/JXTAFAQ.html
> > >>>
> > >>>- Complex Event Processing, using the concepts outlined by David
> > >>>Luckham: From http://www.complexevents.com/
> > >>>
> > >>>Complex Event Processing (CEP) is an emerging technology for
> > building>>>and managing information systems including:
> > >>>
> > >>>    * Business Activity Monitoring
> > >>>    * Business Process Management
> > >>>    * Enterprise Application Integration
> > >>>    * Event-Driven Architectures
> > >>>    * Application Servers and Middleware
> > >>>    * Network and Systems Security
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>>
> > >>
> > >>-- 
> > >>~~~~~~~~~
> > >>john c hardin
> > >>Chair, OASIS ebSOA Technical Committee
> > >>http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/tc_home.php?wg_abbrev=ebsoa
> > >>313.279.1377 new *VONAGE* number
> > >>mailto:john@crossconnections.ws
> > >>
> > >>"The new electronic interdependence recreates the world in the
> > image of a
> > >
> > > global
> > >
> > >>village."
> > >>
> > >>     Marshall McLuhan, "Gutenberg Galaxy", 1962
> > >>
> > >>
> > >
> > >
> > >
> > >
> >
> > -- 
> > ~~~~~~~~~
> > john c hardin
> > Chair, OASIS ebSOA Technical Committee
> > http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/tc_home.php?wg_abbrev=ebsoa
> > 313.279.1377 new *VONAGE* number
> > mailto:john@crossconnections.ws
> >
> > "The new electronic interdependence recreates the world in the
> > image of a global
> > village."
> >
> >     Marshall McLuhan, "Gutenberg Galaxy", 1962
> >
> >
>