CMSC 828V: SOFTWARE AGENTS

http://www.cs.umd.edu/class/fall2002/cmsc828v/

 

 

Software agents are an exciting new area of research.  Agents are used for a wide variety of topics ranging from the creation of personalized newspapers to supply chain automation.  This course will survey various agent applications as well as study theories of software agents. This course counts for credit towards PhD and MS course requirements in the AI area.

 

1. Topics to be Covered

 

A tentative list of topics is listed below.  The order in which they are listed does not reflect the order in which the topics will be taught.

 

·        Auction markets:

o   English auctions

o   Dutch auctions

o   combinatorial auctions

o   spectrum auctions 

·        Agent Markup Languages: 

o   DAML

o   DAML+OIL

o   Semantic web

·        Agent theories:  Shoham, Rosenschein

·        Building Agents on top of Legacy Sources:

o   Language for accessing legacy sources

o   Agent programs

o   Agent rules

o   Semantics of agent programs

·        Temporal Agents

·        Probabilistic Agents

·        Reasoning about Multiagent Systems

 

2. Course Components

 

You will be graded on the following components:

 

• Project (30%): There will be project where you are expected to implement a multiagent system involving some of the concepts described above.  The implementation shall be done in Java.  The project will need to be demonstrated incrementally.
• Homework (20%):  During the semester, you will get 2homeworks.  These homeworks will be of a more theoretical nature than the project and will not involve implementation.  The homeworks will be quite challenging and you should be prepared to expend some effort on them.
• Midterm Exam (25%):  The midterm exam is scheduled for Tuesday, Oct. 29^th.
• Final Exam (25%):  The final exam is scheduled for Friday, Dec. 20, 10:30-12:30.

 

3. Late Project/Homework

 

No late assignments will be accepted unless you have a note from your doctor saying that you were ill during the time the homework was due.

 

4. Textbooks

 

The required text for the course is “Heterogeneous Agent Systems” by V.S. Subrahmanian, P. Bonatti, J. Dix, T. Eiter, F. Ozcan and R. Ross, published by MIT Press. ISBN: 0262194368. 

 

Additional papers and books may be used during the semester.

 

5. Collaboration

 

No collaboration is allowed on homeworks.  In particular, this means that you cannot talk to your fellow students about your solutions to homework problems.  You are encouraged to talk about your project with other students. However, you must write your code and design your solution on your own.

 

6. Instructor

 

The instructor for this course is Prof. V.S. Subrahmanian. My office phone number is 301-405-2711. Email: vs@cs.umd.edu.  Office hours: Tuesday: 9:30-10:45.