WASP -- Web Agent Support Program

Tender DISH


Postscript

Title

WASP - Web Agent Support Program

Authors

Dr. A. Eliëns (Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, SE); Prof Dr P. De Bra (Technische Universiteit Eindhoven, IS); Prof dr J. Treur (Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, AI); Dr F. Brazier (Vrije Universiteit, Amsterdam, AI).

Requested: 2 OIOs and 1 PD

Goal

The project concerns the development of Web Agent Support to enable average users to keep track of relevant information on the Web.

It is our view that, in the near future, access to the Web will increasingly be mediated by intelligent helper applications, software agents, that assist the user in finding relevant and interesting information. The goal of our project WASP is to provide support for developing such agents.

By combining our joint expertise, we plan to develop a framework that encompasses modeling aspects as well as the realization of software assistants for intelligent Web access. Our expertise covers the realization of Web-aware applications (SE/VU), client- and server-side support for information retrieval and information maintenance (IS/TUE), and modeling and specification of cooperative agents in a multi-agent framework(AI/VU).

The project is envisaged to result in a framework providing support for:

As a reference target product for the WASP project we plan to develop Pamela (Personal Assistant for Maintaining Electronic Archives), an application combining the features mentioned above.

Classification

Agents, Information Retrieval, Intelligent User Interfaces

Sketch

Our project aims at providing insight in and solutions for:
Modeling the behavior of cooperative agents
Research in this area will be focussed on defining cooperation in information-retrieval tasks and on expressing user-preferences and information-needs Other topics of interest include modeling users as agents and the verification of agent specifications. (This will draw on the expertise in AI/VU),
Realizing Web-aware agents
The project will employ object-oriented design technology for realizing a component-based approach to integrating multimedia in Web-based applications. (This will draw on the expertise in SE/VU).
Architectural support
We will develop agent-programming support by extending the distributed logic programming language DLP in a suitable way (SE/VU). We strive for a close integration between DLP and the modelling language DESIRE. To allow for managing the information retrieval and management tasks involved in dealing with the Web, helper applications must be developed which employ the native HTTP protocol of the Web. (This will draw on the expertise of IS/TUE in collaboration with SE/VU).

Societal Relevance

Intelligent agents seem to become the dominant user interface metaphor for the average user of information systems in general, and Web-based applications in particular. Our project aims at satisfying the conditions for developing agent-based Web-aware applications, which allow the average user to concentrate on the task at hand rather than the tools and mechanisms needed to access information.

Multidisciplinary Relations

The partners (SE/VU, IS/TUE, AI/VU) are members of SIKS. Apart from pure computer science the WASP project involves research in human-computer interaction, in which a lot of expertise is available at the IPO institute at the TUE. There is also a clear relation to the field of Library and Information Sciences (De Bra).

Embedding in Current Activities

Contact

Dr. A. Eliëns, Fac. Wisk en Inf, De Boelelaan 1081, 081 HV Amsterdam. Email: eliens@cs.vu.nl

mailto:eliens@cs.vu.nl ( Mon Nov 18 13:58:54 MET 1996 )