Development of an intelligent task management system in a manufacturing information network

Abstract Recent research related to agent-based systems has seen significant advances made in terms of the `intelligence' level of collaborative and autonomous features of agents with a number of proposed frameworks reported in contemporary publications. However, the automatic decomposition of job requests into basic tasks to be carried out by relevant agents, which enhances the `intelligence' level of the system, has not received as much attention as it deserves. This article presents an Intelligent Task Management System (ITMS) which can usefully be deployed in a manufacturing information network. It comprises a rule-based inference mechanism responsible for the division of a client's job request into basic tasks and an Object-Oriented Virtual Agent (OOVA) module created using object-oriented technology for achieving automatic task decomposition and assignment. The prototype program of this ITMS has been developed and then tested in an emulated manufacturing environment, using CLIPS as the tool for building the rule-based program and Visual Basic 5 for constructing the OOVA module. It is expected that the experience of developing and implementing the ITMS may be useful for the design of the next generation of collaborative agent-based systems to be adopted in a manufacturing information network. In this article, details related to the structure, design and implementation of the ITMS are covered with actual program codes included. Further, a methodology for the design of the Rule-based Inference Mechanism (RIM) is also presented.

[1]  Ranjit Bose,et al.  CMS: An intelligent knowledge-based tool for organizational procedure modeling and execution , 1995 .

[2]  Daniel S. Weld,et al.  Intelligent Agents on the Internet: Fact, Fiction, and Forecast , 1995, IEEE Expert.

[3]  Krisztina Demeter,et al.  Global manufacturing practices: Edited by D. Clay Whybark and Gyula Vastag, Elsevier, Amsterdam, 1993, 482 p., ISBN: 0 444 899782 , 1994 .

[4]  吉野 智興,et al.  Programmer's guide , 1993 .

[5]  Chen Wang,et al.  Intelligent Agents in the Nuclear Industry , 1997, Computer.

[6]  Pattie Maes,et al.  Agents that reduce work and information overload , 1994, CACM.

[7]  Oscar N. Garcia,et al.  Knowledge-based systems : fundamentals and tools , 1991 .

[8]  Magdi N. Kamel.  A prototype rule-based front end expert system for integrity enforcement in relational data bases: An application to the naval aircraft flight records data base , 1995 .

[9]  Nicholas V. Findler,et al.  Multiagent coordination and cooperation in a distributed dynamic environment with limited resources , 1995, Artif. Intell. Eng..

[10]  Chen Wang,et al.  APACS: a multi-agent system with repository support , 1996, Knowl. Based Syst..

[11]  Sara Reese Hedberg,et al.  Intelligent Agents: The First Harvest of Softbots Looks Promising (Executive Insight) , 1995, IEEE Expert.

[12]  P. E. Clements,et al.  A framework for the realization of cooperative systems , 1995, SIGO.

[13]  Iosif G. Ghetie.  Networks and Systems Management: Platforms Analysis and Evaluation , 1997 .

[14]  Atish P. Sinha,et al.  Completeness and consistency checking of system requirements: An expert agent approach , 1996 .

[15]  Jon Carpenter,et al.  Using rule induction for knowledge acquisition: An expert systems approach to evaluating material errors and irregularities , 1995 .

[16]  Barry Nance.  Introduction to Networking , 1992 .

[17]  John Epton.  Expert systems and optimisation , 1994 .

[18]  Daniel G. Bobrow,et al.  Object-Oriented Programming: Themes and Variations , 1989, AI Mag..

[19]  Ronald C. Arkin,et al.  Intelligent Robotic Systems , 1995, IEEE Expert.

[20]  Ranjit Bose,et al.  Intelligent agents framework for developing knowledge-based decision support systems for collaborative organizational processes☆ , 1996 .

[21]  C. S. Krishnamoorthy,et al.  Artificial intelligence and expert systems for engineers , 1996 .

[22]  Nicholas R. Jennings,et al.  Intelligent agents: theory and practice , 1995, The Knowledge Engineering Review.

[23]  K. Jambunathan,et al.  Knowledge representation and inferencing techniques developed for a knowledge-based front end , 1996 .

[24]  Jae Kyu Lee,et al.  ES∗: An expert systems development planner using a constraint and rule-based approach , 1993 .