Information Technology Reference
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a decision about the reduction of the number of agents of type
A
g
1
in a given node
through their liquidation. As was mentioned, the liquidated agents do not realize the
search for the resource, i.e. the task they are entrusted with.
The limitation of the number of the generated agents.
Agents are generated in
the system by other agents (apart from the case when a certain number of agents
are generated on running the system).
Agents may be equipped with mechanism specifying the aim of making a decision
about generating a new agent of a chosen type, and the generating agent should
consider:
•
the need for generating the agent resulting from the necessity to ensure the specific
functionality of the system resulting from the tasks,
•
the assessment of the possibility of generating resulting from the assessment of
the temporary number of agents of a given type and accessibility to resources
necessary for their operation.
The generating agent may observe and use the features of the environment (including
the state of other agents) for decision-making about the generation of new agents.
This assessment should mainly include the number of agents of a given type, which
may turn out to be difficult, but an approximate estimate of that number is easier and
sufficient.
Coming back to the example of balancing the resource in the graph environment,
we may consider the operation of the mechanism of limiting the generation of new
agents in a situation when there is an underflow of the resource in the whole system
(and therefore, in individual nodes).
The agent of type
A
g
0
, which manages a given node, observes an underflow of
the resource and considers the possibility of generating the agent of type
A
g
1
and
sending it to other nodes to carry out a search for the resource. But, first it analyses
the number and state of agents of type
A
g
1
sent by other nodes and existing at a given
moment in that node.
If in the node, at a given moment, there is a relatively large number of agents
searching for the resource, it may mean that the number of nodes searching for the
resource is large, what is more, there is an underflow of the resource in the whole
system.
If additionally we may observe that the amount of life energy possessed by the
agents is small, it means that they arrive from far away and they have not found the
nodes with the sufficient amount of the resource to load on their way. It confirms
that the amount of the resource in the system is small and therefore generating and
sending another agent of type
A
g
1
in search of the resource is pointless. It opens up
the possibility of limiting the number of generated agents in the system.
The concept of unemployed agents.
An unemployed agent searches for “work”,
i.e. searches for tasks to be realized in the system. After finding the task, the agent
transforms into this type of agent which is necessary for realizing this task. It is
a characteristic connection between the liquidation operation and the generating
