From Simulation to Development in MAS - A JADE-based Approach

Multi-agent systems (MAS) present an effective approach to the efficient development of modular systems composed of interacting agents. Several frameworks exist that aid the development of MAS, but they are often not very appropriate for some kind of uses, such as for Multi-Agent-based Simulation (MABS). Other frameworks exist for running simulations, sharing little with the former. While open agent-based applications benefit from adopting development and interaction standards, such as those proposed by FIPA, most MABS frameworks do not support them. In this paper we propose an approach to bridge the gap between the development and simulation of MAS, by putting forward two complementary tools. The Simple API for JADE-based Simulations (SAJaS) enhances MABS frameworks with JADE-based features, and the MAS Simulation to Development (MASSim2Dev) tool allows the automatic conversion of a SAJaS-based simulation into a JADE MAS, and vice-versa. Repast Simphony was used as the base MABS framework. Our proposal provides increased simulation performance while enabling JADE programmers to quickly develop their simulation models using familiar concepts. Validation tests demonstrate the significant performance gain in using SAJaS with Repast Simphony when compared with JADE and show that using MASSim2Dev preserves the original functionality of the system.