The notion of mobile agent, a software component that can move autonomously between the different nodes of a network is gaining wide popularity in business and in academia. The term mobile agent was first introduced in 1994. Since then, lots of research has been carried out in various aspects of the newly introduced paradigm. It might even be surprising to know that a recent census reports the existence of more than 70 mobile agent systems. Therefore, there is a need to gather and analyze what has been done so far in this new area. / This survey reviews the field of mobile agents by summarizing the key concepts and giving an overview of the most important implementations. Design and implementation issues of mobile agents are analyzed in general. Some of the most important mobile agent systems are presented and discussed. Java's support for mobile agent development is thoroughly examined. In addition, the role of the Common Object Request Broker Architecture (CORBA) as a broker between mobile agents and their environment is also analyzed. Most importantly, a survey of the major security concerns is provided followed by an analysis of the currently available techniques to address these concerns. Last but not least, a detailed analysis of the Foundation for Intelligent Physical Agents (FIPA) standards for interoperability between heterogeneous agents and their hosts is included. This survey will help in understanding the potentials of mobile agents and why they have not caught on. Once progress is made in the areas of security, programming language support for specific mobile agent requirements, and standards for coordination between heterogeneous agents, it is expected that the mobile agent paradigm will dramatically revolutionize the way the Internet is being used now.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:LACETR/oai:collectionscanada.gc.ca:QMM.32754 |
| Date | January 2002 |
| Creators | Basha, Nagi Nabil. |
| Contributors | Newborn, Monty (advisor) |
| Publisher | McGill University |
| Source Sets | Library and Archives Canada ETDs Repository / Centre d'archives des thèses électroniques de Bibliothèque et Archives Canada |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Electronic Thesis or Dissertation |
| Format | application/pdf |
| Coverage | Master of Science (School of Computer Science.) |
| Rights | All items in eScholarship@McGill are protected by copyright with all rights reserved unless otherwise indicated. |
| Relation | alephsysno: 001873576, proquestno: MQ78826, Theses scanned by UMI/ProQuest. |
Page generated in 0.0015 seconds