Acquaintance models for integration-oriented multi-agent systems

The paper addresses problems of efficient knowledge representation and exploration of social knowledge enabling agents´ integration into the multi-agent community. The proposed solutions are based on task decomposition, organization of negotiations, responsibility delegation and other aspects of social behavior in multi-agent systems aimed at integration of already existing software components. It is supposed that all the social knowledge is kept separated from the problem solving knowledge and agents´ specific internal intelligence and that it is organized and administered in the acquaintance models located in the agents´ wrappers. A specific tri-base acquaintance model is formalized and discussed throughout the paper. This model helps to optimize the communication traffic and to implement meta-reasoning processes. Practical applications of the acquaintance model in different fields are presented, and acquired experience is discussed.