MESSIA: Combining MESSAGE with GAIA

This paper proposes a new Agent-Oriented Software Engineering (AOSE) method – MESSIA. MESSIA is built on two popular AOSE methodologies: GAIA and MESSAGE. While, it has its own characteristics: 1) MESSIA unites the analysis models of GAIA with the refinement strategy of MESSAGE, which bridges the large gap between the system requirements and the needed models; 2) The hierarchical analysis and design in MESSIA utilize the hierarchical structure of the systems to be developed, and help developers to give their attentions to only a small part of the system in one time, which makes it possible for them to decompose the system gradually and efficiently.