The aim of this work is to design and implement a graphic development environment of agent language ALLL. Language ALLL going to be described in details, such as the ANTLR framework for generating language recognition tools. Theoretical basis of multi-agent systems, together with the features of the selected platform, will be discussed as well. Description of the implementation is followed by the presentation of testing. Closure deals with the discussion of the achieved results.

Le développement et la multiplication des systèmes et plateformes informatiques pour accéder à de l'information ne fait que s'accentuer depuis une trentaine d'années. Le grand volume d'information disponible a soulevé de nombreux défis scientifiques dans des domaines tel que la recherche d'information. Pour accéder à des documents regroupés dans un corpus numérique, il faut être en mesure d'exprimer son besoin en information, souvent sous la forme d'une requête, d'y associer les documents pertinents et de les présenter de la meilleure manière possible aux utilisateurs. La recherche documentaire dans un corpus documentaire thématique présentant un haut niveau de technicité dans la discipline concernée s'apparente à un processus de navigation guidé par un besoin d'information d'un utilisateur. Cette navigation nécessite l'usage d'outils classiques de recherche d'information pour sélectionner des documents pertinents en fonction d'une requête, mais ils doivent être complétés par des mécanismes de personnalisation et d'adaptation capable de faire évoluer la représentation du besoin en fonction des spécificités d'un utilisateur, de sa navigation en cours ou du corpus considéré. En effet, l'accès aux documents d'un corpus numérique soulève des problèmes liés à la recherche d'information, à la visualisation des résultats d'une requête et à la navigation entre les documents. Le processus de recherche d'information nécessite des améliorations et surtout l'intégration de l'utilisateur comme facteur principal à prendre en compte dans la recherche de satisfaction de son besoin informationnel. Nous considérons plusieurs approches pour aider un utilisateur dans sa recherche de documents. Une première assistance porte sur la reformulation de requêtes en visant un public d'utilisateurs peu familier avec les termes techniques du domaine et en difficulté pour exprimer sous la forme d'une requête leur besoin. La deuxième approche que nous proposons consiste à ne pas considérer l'utilisateur isolément mais à le rapprocher de ceux ayant exprimé des recherches similaires pour retrouver les documents qu'ils avaient jugés pertinents. Enfin, nous incluons des travaux issus du domaine de la recommandation afin de mieux cerner le besoin informationnel de l'utilisateur et l'aider à trouver plus facilement ce qu'il cherche en lui recommandant des ressources documentaires. Nous proposons dans cette thèse de traiter cette diversité d'influence par un système multi-agent interagissant par un environnement partagé représentant la navigation des utilisateurs, de manière à pouvoir adapter le système en utilisant l'une ou l'autre des techniques d'assistance proposées en fonction de l'expertise de l'utilisateur. Ce travail a été appliqué à une recherche documentaire dans un corpus numérique de documents juridiques. / The development and multiplication of information systems and platforms for information access has been accentuated over the past thirty years. The large volume of information available has raised many scientific challenges in different areas such as information retrieval. To access documents grouped in a digital corpus, one must be able to express his/her information need, often in the form of a query, to associate the relevant documents and present them in the best possible way to users. Document research in a thematic digital corpus presenting a high level of technicality in the concerned discipline can be considered as a browsing process driven by some information needs. Such browses requires the use of traditional information retrieval tools to select relevant documents based on a query But they can be improved by the use of customization and adaptation mechanisms in order to refine the representation of information needs according to the specificities of a user, his current browsing or the corpus considered. Indeed, access to digital documents raises problems related to the search for information, the visualization of the results of a query and the browsing between the documents. The process of information retrieval requires to be improved and especially by the integration of the user as a main factor to take into account in the search for satisfaction of his/her information needs. We consider several approaches to help users in their search for documents. A first assistance concerns the reformulation of queries by targeting an audience of users unfamiliar with the technical terms of the field and struggling to express in the form of a query their need. The second approach that we propose is not to consider the user in isolation but to bring it closer to those who have expressed similar research to find the documents they considered relevant. Finally, we include works from the field of the recommendation to better understand the informational needs of the user and help them find what they are looking for by recommending documentary resources. In this thesis, we propose to treat this diversity of influence by a multi-agent system interacting with a shared environment representing the users browsing so that the system may be adapted to use either assistance facilities according to the user's expertise. We applied our work for document research in a digital corpus of legal documents.

Les systèmes multi-agents (MAS) et la commande coopérative ont fait l'objet de nombreuses recherches ces dernières années. Les domaines d'application sont très diverses et dans le cas des systèmes multi-véhicules, des approches ont été développées pour des unmanned air vehicles (UAVs), satellites, avions... Les types de missions envisagées sont des missions complexes telles l’exploration ou la surveillance de zones, la recherche et le suivi de cibles d'intérêt. Cependant, la coopération requière des échanges de communication entre les agents. Lorsque ceux-ci sont nombreux, cet échange peut conduire à des saturations du réseau, à l'augmentation des délais de transmission ou l’occurrence de pertes de paquets, d'où l'intérêt de réduire le nombre de communication. Dans les méthodes event-triggered, une communication est envoyée quand une condition, basée sur des paramètres choisis et un seuil prédéfini, est remplie. La principale difficulté est de définir une condition qui permettra de limiter les échanges sans dégrader l'exécution de la mission choisie. Dans le cas d'un système distribué, chaque agent doit maintenir une estimation de la valeur de l'état des autres agents afin de remplacer l'absence d'informations due à la communication réduite. L'objectif de cette thèse est de développer des lois de commandes et des estimateurs distribuées pour un système multi-agent afin de réduire le nombre de communication par méthode event-triggered, tout en prenant en compte la présence de perturbations. L'étude est divisée en deux grandes parties. La première décrit une méthode de communication event-triggered permettant de converger vers un consensus pour un système multi-agents de modèle d'évolution dynamique linéaire généralisée et en présence de perturbations d'état. Pour réduire les communications, un estimateur précis de l'état des agents est proposé, couplé à un estimateur de l'estimation de l'erreur, ainsi qu'un protocole de communication adapté. En prenant en compte la commande appliquée à chaque agent, l'estimateur proposé permet d'obtenir un consensus avec un nombre bien inférieur de communication que de la méthode de référence dans l'état de l'art. La seconde partie propose une stratégie de réduction de communication pour une commande de vol en formation permettant de suivre une trajectoire de référence. La dynamique des agents est décrite par un système Euler-Lagrange incluant des perturbations et des méconnaissances sur les paramètres du modèle. Différentes structures d'estimateurs sont proposées pour reconstruire les informations manquantes. La condition d'event-triggered distribuée proposée est basée sur l'écart relatif entre les positions et vitesses réelles et désirées des agents, ainsi que l'erreur relative entre la valeur estimée de l'état de l'agent et la valeur réelle. Une trajectoire de référence unique est déterminée pour guider la flotte. L'effet des perturbations sur la formation et la communication a été analysé. Enfin, les méthodes proposées ont été adaptées pour tenir compte des dégradations de performances dues aux pertes de données et aux délais de communication. Pour les deux types d'approches présentées les conditions de la stabilité du MAS ont été obtenues par l'intermédiaire de fonctions de Lyapunov et l'absence de paradoxe de Zeno a été étudiée. / A large amount of research work has been recently dedicated to the study of Multi-Agent System and cooperative control. Applications to mobile robots, like unmanned air vehicles (UAVs), satellites, or aircraft have been tackled to insure complex mission such as exploration or surveillance. However, cooperative tasking requires communication between agents, and for a large number of agents, the number of communication exchanges may lead to network saturation, increased delays or loss of transferred packets, from the interest in reducing them. In event-triggered strategy, a communication is broadcast when a condition, based on chosen parameters and some threshold, is fulfilled. The main difficulty consists in determining the communication triggering condition (CTC) that will ensure the completion of the task assigned to the MAS. In a distributed strategy, each agent maintains an estimate value of others agents state to replace missing information due to limited communication. This thesis focuses on the development of distributed control laws and estimators for multi-agent system to limit the number of communication by using event-triggered strategy in the presence of perturbation with two main topics, i.e. consensus and formation control. The first part addresses the problem of distributed event-triggered communications for consensus of a multi-agent system with both general linear dynamics and state perturbations. To decrease the amount of required communications, an accurate estimator of the agent states is introduced, coupled with an estimator of the estimation error, and adaptation of communication protocol. By taking into account the control input of the agents, the proposed estimator allows to obtain a consensus with fewer communications than those obtained by a reference method. The second part proposes a strategy to reduce the number of communications for displacement-based formation control while following a desired reference trajectory. Agent dynamics are described by Euler-Lagrange models with perturbations and uncertainties on the model parameters. Several estimator structures are proposed to rebuild missing information. The proposed distributed communication triggering condition accounts for inter-agent displacements and the relative discrepancy between actual and estimated agent states. A single a priori trajectory has to be evaluated to follow the desired path. Effect of state perturbations on the formation and on the communications is analyzed. Finally, the proposed methods have been adapted to consider packet dropouts and communication delays. For both types of problems, Lyapunov stability of the MAS has been developed and absence of Zeno behavior is studied.

Cette thèse s’intéresse à l’étude de la stabilité des systèmes à commutation qui évoluent sur un domaine de temps non uniforme en introduisant la théorie des échelles de temps. On s’intéresse essentiellement aux systèmes dynamiques linéaires à commutation définis sur une échelle de temps particulière T = P{tσk ,tk+1} = ∪∞k=0[tσk , tk+1]. Le système étudié commute entre un sous-système dynamique continu sur les intervalles ∪∞k=0[tσk , tk+1[ et un sous-système dynamique discret aux instants ∪∞k=0{tk+1} (à temps discret) avec un pas discret qui varie dans le temps. Dans une première partie, des conditions suffisantes sont données pour garantir la stabilité exponentielle de cette classe de systèmes à commutation. Ensuite, des conditions nécessaires et suffisantes de stabilité sont données en déterminant une région de stabilité exponentielle. Dans une deuxième partie, la stabilité de cette classe des systèmes à commutation avec des perturbations nonlinéaires a été traitée en utilisant des majorations de la solution, puis en introduisant l’approche de la fonction de Lyapunov commune. La troisième partie est consacrée au problème du consensus en présence d’interruptions de transmission d’informations où le système multi-agent en boucle fermée peut être représenté comme un système à commutation par une combinaison de modèles de systèmes linéaires à temps continu et de systèmes linéaires à temps discret. / This thesis deals with the stability analysis of switched systems that evolve on non uniform time domain by introducing the time scale theory. We are interested mainly in dynamical linear switched systems defined on particular time scale T = P{tσk ,tk+1} = ∪∞k=0[tσk, tk+1]. The studied system switches between a continuous-time dynamical subsystem on the intervals ∪∞k=0[tσk, tk+1[ and a discrete-time dynamical subsystem on instants ∪∞k=0{tk+1} (a discrete time) with a time-varying discrete step. In a first part, sufficient conditions are given to guarantee the exponential stability of this class of switched systems. Then necessary and sufficient conditions for stability are given by determining a region of exponential stability. In the second part, the stability of this class of switched systems with nonlinear uncertainties, is treated using majoration of the solution, and after that by introducing the approach of a common Lyapunov function. The third part is devoted to the consensus problem under intermittent information transmissions where the closed-loop multi-agent system can be represented as a switched system using a combination of linear continuous-time and linear discrete-time systems.

In den letzten Jahren hat sich die rapide Entwicklung der Elektrotechnik ebenso wie die der Softwaretechnologie auf die numerischen Steuerungen in den heutigen CNC-Maschinen groß ausgewirkt. Diese numerischen Steuerungen sind sowohl intelligenter und flexibler als auch mit größerer Internspeicherkapazität ausgerüstet. Dies führt zu einer Änderung der Art und Weise, wie DNC-Systeme zu etablieren sind, besonders solcher, die auf bisher verfügbaren, aber ungleichartigen DNC-Systemen basieren. In einem solch heterogenen DNC-System wird Datenspeicherungsfähigkeit stärker verteilt angeordnet, d.h., sie ist nicht nur in einem zentralen DNC-Server vorhanden, sondern auch in Terminals oder Steuerungen selbst angelagert. Diese Änderung des Archivierungsmittels benötigt neue DNC-Software, die die DNC-Grundfunktionen voll realisiert. Zudem sollte sie auch den neuen spezifischen Softwareanforderungen entsprechen und erlauben, neue Funktionen, z.B. Maschinendatenerfassung, Betriebsdatenerfassung usw., als Module hinzuzufügen. Derzeit wird die Agententechnologie bzw. ein MAS (Multiagentensystem) als ein aussichtsreicher Ansatz angesehen, um die Probleme der heutigen komplexen Softwaresysteme, wie ungleichartige Systemumgebungen und verteilte Strukturen, zu lösen. Die vorliegende Arbeit stellt die Idee zum Aufbau eines heterogenen DNC-Systems und die Konzipierung zur Gestaltung der agentenbasierten DNC-Software vor. Ausgehend von dem vorgestellten Lösungskonzept wird zudem der Programmassistent als erster Modul der agentenbasierten DNC-Software präsentiert. / In the network-based DNC systems and especially heterogeneous DNC systems data get more distributed due to the ability to store not only in the DNC Server but also in the CNC controller or CNC Terminal. This leads a challenge to the DNC software in the implementation of its basic functions. The agent-based DNC software with assistants (ADNC) is suggested to solve the above problem. Its tasks are to collect distributed NC information and transfer data safely as well as performing other extended functions, i.e. NC program generation, machine data collection, production data collection, control machines in system, etc. The present work presented the concept to develop the ADNC and its first prototype. This prototype was developed in a process using a framework of agent-based assistants, called AgentAP. It is applicable on distributed manufacturing data and had been implemented on the agent platform JADE. The module Program Assistant, one of these prototype modules, which is responsible for management, bidirectional transfer, and monitoring change of NC programs, is also discussed.

Game balance has been a challenge for game developers since the time games have become more complex. There have been a handful of proposals for game balancing processes outside the manual labor-intensive play testing methods, which most game developers often are forced to use simply due to the lack of better methods. Simple solutions, like restrictive game play, are limited because of their inability to provide insight on interdependencies among the mechanisms in the game. Complex techniques framed around the potential of AI algorithms are limited by computational budgets or cognition inability to assess human actions. In order to find a middle ground we investigate Game Theory and Mechanism Design concepts. Both have proven to be effective tools to analyse strategic situations among interacting participants, or in this case `players'. We test the feasibility of using these techniques in an Real Time Strategy (RTS) game domain to understand game balance. MicroRTS, a small and simple execution of an RTS game is employed as our model. The results provide promising insight on the effectiveness of the method in detecting imbalances and further inspection to find the cause. An additional benefit out of this technique, besides detecting for game imbalances, the approach can be leveraged to create imbalances. This is useful when the designer or player desires to do so.

[pt] A área da saúde precisa lidar com diversos problemas relacionados a questões de infraestrutura, falta de pessoal qualificado e grande número de pacientes. Como solução para problemas desta natureza surgiu o u-Healthcare, uma aplicação dos conceitos de Computação Ubíqua (UbiComp) na área da assistência médica. u-Healthcare permite a supervisão da saúde a qualquer tempo e a qualquer lugar, a partir de dispositivos eletrônicos conectados à internet. Entretanto, a ampliação da supervisão da saúde para o entorno ubíquo não pode ser feita com protocolos e procedimentos clínicos atualmente utilizados, já que essa abordagem aumentaria drasticamente o consumo de tempo e recursos. Por esse motivo, a construção de aplicações para fornecimento de serviços se saúde pode apoiar-se em áreas de pesquisa de Sistemas Multi-Agente (SMA) e Trabalho Cooperativo Auxiliado por Computador (TCAC). Nesse sentido, SMA é utilizado para automatização de processos, através do uso das propriedades dos agentes de software. Em contrapartida, TCAC permite estabelecer um modelo de cooperação entre os participantes de uma determinada aplicação. Com base nestes aspectos, neste trabalho propõese a modelagem e desenvolvimento de um framework que auxilie a construção de aplicações voltadas para u-Healthcare, baseadas em conceitos de SMA e TCAC. Para ilustrar a utilização do framework, são apresentados dois cenários de uso. O primeiro cenário corresponde a um sistema de monitoramento fetal, que realiza a detecção precoce de anormalidades no feto. O segundo cenário, por sua vez, consiste em um assistente de administração de medicamentos, que permite ajudar ao médico no controle de medicamentos que usam seus pacientes. / [en] The health area needs to deal with various problems related to issues of infrastructure, lack of qualified personnel and a large number of patients. As a solution to problems of this nature, u-Healthcare was created as an application of the concepts of Ubiquitous Computing (UbiComp) in the area of health care. u- Healthcare allows health monitoring at any time and place from electronic devices connected to the Internet. However, the expansion of health monitoring for an ubiquitous environment cannot be performed with protocols and procedures currently used, since this approach would drastically increase the consumption of time and resources. For that reason, the development of tools to provide health services can be supported in research areas such as Multi-Agent System (MAS) and Computer Supported Cooperative Work (CSCW). In that sense, MAS can be used to automate processes through the properties of software agents. On the other hand CSCW gives the possibility of establishing a model of cooperation among the participants on the application. Based on these aspects, this work proposes the modeling and development of a framework capable of providing support and help on the construction of dedicated u- Healthcare applications which should be based on the concepts of MAS and CSCW. To illustrate the use of the framework, there are presented two scenarios of use. The first scenario corresponds to a fetal monitoring system, which allows early detection of fetal abnormalities. The second scenario consists of a drug administration assistant, which allows the doctor to control drug use by his patients.

[pt] A ideia principal da Internet das Coisas (IoT) é conectar bilhões de coisas à Internet nos próximos anos, a exemplo de carros, roupas e comidas. Entretanto, muitos problemas precisam ser resolvidos antes que essa ideia possa ser concretizada. Alguns desses problemas estão relacionados à necessidade de construir sistemas para IoT que sejam auto-organizáveis e autoadaptativos. Este trabalho, portanto, apresenta a elaboração do Framework para Internet das Coisas (FIoT), que oferece suporte ao desenvolvimento de aplicações para IoT com essas características. Ele é baseado nos paradigmas de Sistemas Multiagente (SMA) e algumas técnicas abordadas em Aprendizado de Máquina, a exemplo de redes neurais e algoritmos evolutivos. Um agente pode ter algumas características, como autonomia e sociabilidade, que tornam SMAs compatíveis com sistemas que requerem auto-organização. Redes neurais e algoritmos de evolução vêm sendo comumente usados nos estudos de robótica, no intuito de prover autonomia e adaptação à agentes físicos (ex.: robôs, sensores). Para demonstrar o uso do FIoT, dois grupos de problemas em IoT serão instanciados: (i) Cidades Inteligentes e (ii) Quantificação de Coisas. / [en] The agreed fact about the Internet of Things (IoT) is that, within the coming years, billions of resources, such as cars, clothes and foods will be connected to the Internet. However, several challenging issues need to be addressed before the IoT vision becomes a reality. Some open problems are related to the need of building self-organizing and self-adaptive IoT systems. To create IoT applications with these features, this work presents a Framework for Internet of Things (FIoT). Our approach is based on concepts from Multi-Agent Systems (MAS) and Machine Learning Techniques, such as a neural network and evolutionary algorithms. An agent could have characteristics, such as autonomy and social ability, which makes MAS suitable for systems requiring self-organization (SO). Neural networks and algorithms of evolution have been commonly used in robotic studies to provide embodied agents (as robots and sensors) with autonomy and adaptive capabilities. To illustrate the use of FIoT, we derived two different instances from IoT applications: (i) Quantified Things and (ii) Smart Cities. We show how exible points of our framework are instantiated to generate an application.

The ability to solve problems creatively has been crucial for the adaptation and survival of humans throughout history. In many real–life situations, cognitive processes are not isolated. Humans are social, they communicate and form groups to solve daily problems and make decisions. Therefore, the final output of cognitive processes can come from multi–brains in groups rather than an individual one. This multi–brain output can be largely different from the output that an individual person produces in isolation. As a result, it is essential to include team–level processes in cognitive models to make a more accurate description of real– world cognitive processes in general and problem solving in particular. This research aims to answer the general question of how working in a team affects creative problem solving. For doing that, first, we propose a computational model for multi-agent creative problem solving. Then, we show how the model can be used to study the factors that are involved in creativity in teams and potentially will suggest answers to questions such as, ‘how team size is related to creativity’.

This thesis presents methods for simplifying the use of multi-agent systems in Plug & Produce. The demand for customized products and low volume production is constantly increasing. The industry has for many years used dedicated manufacturing systems where it is difficult and expensive to adapt to new product designs. Instead, factories are forced to use human workers for certain tasks that demand high flexibility and rapid adaption for new product designs. Several solutions have been proposed over the years to create highly flexible automation systems that automatically handles rapid adaption for new products. A concept called Plug & Produce aims at creating a system where resources and parts can be added in minutes rather than days in dedicated systems. One promising solution for implementing Plug & Produce is the distributed approach called multi-agent systems, where each resource and part get its own controller that communicates with each other to reach manufacturing goals. The idea is that the system automatically handles the adaption for new products. However, still today the use of such systems is extremely limited in the industry. One reason is the lack of mature multi-agent systems that are easy to use and that hides the complexity of the underlying agent system from the users. This is a huge problem since these systems tend to be more complex than traditional approaches. Thus, this thesis focuses on simplifying the use of multi-agent systems by proposing various methods for bringing the multi-agent technology for Plug & Produce closer to the industry. / Denna avhandling presenterar metoder för att förenkla användningen av multiagent-system för Plug & Produce. Efterfrågan på kundanpassade produkter och lågvolymproduktion ökar ständigt. Industrin har under många år använt sig avdedikerade tillverkningssystem som gör det både svårt och dyrt att anpassa sig till nya produktdesigner. Istället tvingas fabriker att antälla onödigt många operatörer för vissa arbetsuppgifter där det krävs hög flexibilitet och snabb anpassning till nya produktdesigner. Flera lösningar har föreslagits under åren för att skapa flexibla automatiseringssystem som automatiskt hanterar snabb omställning till nya produkter. Ett koncept som heter Plug & Produce handlar om att skapa system där nya typer av resurser och produkter kan kopplas in i systemet på ett fåtal minuter snarare än dagar i traditionella system. För att implementera Plug & Produce kan multi-agent-system användas, där varje resurs och produkt får sin egen styrning. Agenterna kan sedan kommunicera med varandra för att nå de mål som satts upp för tillverkningen av produkterna. Tanken är att systemet automatiskt hanterar anpassningen till nya produkter. Idag är dock användningen av sådana system extremt begränsad i industrin. En av anledningarna är avsaknaden av mogna multi-agent-system som är lätta att använda och där komplexiteten hos det underliggande agensystemet kan döljas från användaren. Detta är ett stort problem eftersom multi-agent-system tenderar att vara mer komplexa än traditionella system. Därför fokuserar denna avhandling på att förenkla användningen av multi-agent-system genom att föreslå olika metoder som kan underlätta användandet av multi-agent-tekniken för Plug & Produce i industrin.