Modeling Interaction in Cooperative Information Systems Using Coloured Petri Nets

摘要

Cooperative Information Systems (CIS) become relevant to integrate different kinds of systems so as to work collaboratively for a common goal. CIS are considered by nature as dynamic systems, and one of the most difficult problems related to the dynamic of the system is how to model and control simultaneously multiple interactions among agents in a friendly way. Consequently, expressiveness becomes a problem related to the representation so far, the similar systems cope neither with the problem of expressiveness nor with multiple interactions in a satisfactory way. We propose in this paper, an integrated methodology based on Coloured Petri Nets (CP nets) in order to model the interaction mechanism in a CIS and reduce the associated complexity in the representation of the dynamic of the system. This methodology provides us great advantages in the representation and reasoning for the interaction mechanism modeled in CIS. The methodology integrates mainly: a) the action basic loop [15] in order to represent the system interactions and to model organization conversations, b) the CP nets in the interaction design and system simulation, c) the communicative acts of FIPA (Foundation for Intelligent Physical Agents), including in the Agent Communication Language Specification [13].