ANEMONA : a multi-agent methodology for holonic manufacturing systems

ANEMONA is a multi-agent system (MAS) methodology for holonic manufacturing system (HMS) analysis and design. ANEMONA defines a mixed top-down and bottom-up development process, and provides HMS-specific guidelines to help designers identify and implement holons. The analysis phase is defined in two stages: System Requirements Analysis, and Holon Identification and Specification. This analysis provides high-level HMS specifications, adopting a top-down recursive approach which provides a set of elementary elements and assembling rules. The next stage is Holon Design, a bottom-up process to produce the system architecture from the analysis models. The Holons Implementation stage produces an Executable Code for the SetUp and Configuration stage. Finally, maintenances functions are executed in the Operation and Maintenance stage. The book will be of interest to researchers and students involved in artificial intelligence and software engineering, and manufacturing engineers in industry and academia.

Author Notes

Vicente Botti is head of the Group de Tecnologia Informatica - Inteligencia Artificial (GTI-IA) at the Universidad Politécnica de Valencia. His research interests are real-time artificial intelligence and multiagent systems.

Adriana Giret has a PhD in Computer Science and lectures at the Universidad de Valencia, where she works within the Departamento de Sistemas Informaticos y Computacion. Her research interests are multiagent systems; holonic manufacturing systems; and agent-supported simulation for manufacturing systems.

Acronyms	p. xv
1 Introduction	p. 1
1.1 Structure of the Book	p. 2
Part I Backgrounds
2 Holonic Manufacturing Systems	p. 7
2.1 Holon	p. 8
2.2 Holonic Manufacturing Systems - HMS	p. 9
2.3 HMS State-of-the-Art	p. 10
2.3.1 Holon Architecture	p. 10
2.3.2 Holons Interconnection	p. 15
2.3.3 Holons Operation	p. 17
2.3.4 Holonic Control	p. 19
2.3.5 Methods for HMS Development	p. 20
2.4 Conclusions	p. 20
3 Holons and Agents	p. 21
3.1 Agents	p. 21
3.2 Holons and Agents: Two Similar Modeling Notions	p. 22
3.2.1 Autonomy	p. 23
3.2.2 Reactivity	p. 23
3.2.3 Proactivity	p. 24
3.2.4 Sociability	p. 25
3.2.5 Cooperation	p. 26
3.2.6 Openness	p. 26
3.2.7 Rationality	p. 27
3.2.8 Mental Attitudes	p. 28
3.2.9 Learning	p. 28
3.2.10 Benevolence	p. 29
3.2.11 Mobility	p. 29
3.2.12 Recursiveness	p. 29
3.2.13 Physical and Information Processing Part	p. 30
3.3 Recursiveness	p. 30
3.4 Abstract Agent	p. 32
3.4.1 Abstract-agent Structure	p. 34
3.5 Conclusion	p. 38
Part II Methodology for Holonic Manufacturing System
4 HMS Development	p. 41
4.1 Modeling Requirements	p. 41
4.1.1 Functional Requirements	p. 41
4.1.2 Software Engineering Requirements	p. 42
4.2 Holonic Manufacturing System Methodologies	p. 44
4.3 Multi-agent System Methods	p. 45
4.3.1 General-purpose MAS Methods	p. 45
4.3.2 MAS Methods for Manufacturing Systems	p. 52
4.4 Enterprise Modeling	p. 53
4.5 Comparative Overview	p. 54
4.6 Conclusions	p. 57
5 ANEMONA Notation	p. 59
5.1 ANEMONA Metamodel	p. 60
5.2 Basic Modeling Entities	p. 62
5.3 Agent Model	p. 66
5.3.1 Abstract Agent and Role	p. 67
5.3.2 Abstract Agent, Role and Goal	p. 67
5.3.3 Abstract Agent and Belief	p. 68
5.3.4 Abstract Agent, Role and Task	p. 68
5.4 Task/Goal Model	p. 70
5.4.1 Abstract Agent, Task and Goals	p. 70
5.4.2 Task, Goals and Beliefs	p. 72
5.4.3 Task Specification	p. 73
5.4.4 Goal Decomposition and Goal Dependencies	p. 75
5.5 Interaction Model	p. 78
5.5.1 Interactions, Abstract Agents, Roles and Goals	p. 79
5.5.2 Interactions, Interaction Units, Abstract Agents, Roles and Tasks	p. 80
5.5.3 Interaction Specification	p. 82
5.5.4 Interactions and Organizations	p. 83
5.6 Environment Model	p. 83
5.7 Organization Model	p. 84
5.7.1 Organization Structure	p. 85
5.7.2 Social Relations Among Autonomous Entities	p. 86
5.7.3 Organization Functional Definition	p. 88
5.8 Conclusions	p. 89
6 ANEMONA Development Process	p. 91
6.1 SPEM	p. 91
6.2 A Simplified Supply Chain Case Study	p. 92
6.3 The Method	p. 93
6.3.1 System Requirement	p. 94
6.3.2 Analysis	p. 97
6.3.3 Design	p. 117
6.3.4 Holon Implementation	p. 130
6.3.5 Setup and Configuration	p. 132
6.3.6 Operation and Maintenance	p. 132
6.4 Conclusions	p. 132
Part III Evaluation and Case Study
7 Evaluation of the ANEMONA Methodology	p. 137
7.1 ANEMONA Applicability to Intelligent Manufacturing Problems	p. 138
7.2 ANEMONA vs. State-of-the-Art Methods	p. 141
7.3 Conclusions	p. 142
8 Case Study	p. 143
8.1 Requirements	p. 143
8.1.1 Organizational Chart/Departments	p. 144
8.1.2 Business Processes	p. 147
8.1.3 System Scope	p. 149
8.1.4 Processes to Control	p. 149
8.1.5 Operation Conditions	p. 154
8.1.6 Goals	p. 155
8.2 Analysis	p. 156
8.2.1 Iteration 1	p. 156
8.2.2 Iteration 2	p. 168
8.2.3 Iteration 3	p. 179
8.3 Design	p. 185
8.3.1 Holons Specification	p. 185
8.3.2 System Architecture	p. 195
8.4 Conclusions	p. 200
9 Conclusions	p. 201
9.1 Review	p. 201
9.2 Future Work	p. 203
References	p. 205
Index	p. 213

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