A Programming Language for Coordinating Group Actions

Coordination and cooperation are crucial notions in multi-agent systems. We provide a constraint programming language called GrAPL, with facilities for group communication, group formation and group collaboration. GrAPL includes three novel statements. Two of these enable groups of agents to communicate about possible constraints on a specific action they might do together. If the demands of the agents are compatible, the group reaches an agreement regarding future executions of the action discussed. The third statement is synchronised action execution. Groups of agents can perform an action together, as long as their constraints on the action are satisfied.