The Jackal Agent Communication Infrastructure

Jackal is a Java-based tool for communication using the KQML agent communication language. Some features that make it extremely valuable to agent development are its conversation management facilities, exible, blackboard style interface and ease of integration. Jackal has been developed in support of an investigation of the use of agents in enterprise-wide integration of planning and execution for manufacturing. Additionally, Jackal has been used as a framework for exploring alternative conversation-based approaches to managing agent interaction. In particular, we have been investigating the use of Colored Petri Nets as the underlying formal model for a conversation speci cation language. This model carries the relative simplicity and graphical representation of the more familiar Finite State Machine, along with greater expressive power and support for concurrency. This paper describes Jackal at a surface and design level, and demonstrates its use in a multi-agent system that supports intelligent integration of enterprise planning and execution. It further describes the use of Colored Petri Nets for the speci cation of interation protocols within a system such as Jackal.