Mobile Agent Resources
Curated collection of tools, platforms, and learning materials for mobile agent development.
Active Agent Platforms
Modern and actively maintained platforms for multi-agent system development.
JADE
Java Agent DEvelopment Framework - The most widely used platform for developing multi-agent systems. Fully compliant with FIPA specifications, supports agent mobility, and provides a comprehensive set of tools including a GUI for monitoring agents.
SPADE
Smart Python Agent Development Environment - A modern multi-agent systems platform based on XMPP messaging. Features asynchronous programming with Python's asyncio, behaviors, and web interface for agent management.
Jason
An interpreter for an extended version of AgentSpeak, implementing the BDI (Belief-Desire-Intention) architecture. Integrates with JADE and provides a robust environment for cognitive agent development.
JACK
Commercial agent-oriented programming environment built on Java. Features BDI architecture with explicit plans, events, and beliefs. Used extensively in defense and industrial applications.
Mesa
Python framework for agent-based modeling. Excellent for simulations with built-in visualization, data collection, and parameter sweeping capabilities. Great for scientific research.
FIPA Standards
Foundation for Intelligent Physical Agents - International standards defining agent communication languages (ACL), interaction protocols, and architectural specifications for interoperability.
Historical Platforms
Pioneering platforms that shaped mobile agent technology. Many are no longer actively developed but remain important for understanding the field's evolution.
Aglets
IBM's pioneering mobile agent platform (1996). Introduced the concept of "aglet" (agent + applet) - Java objects that could migrate between hosts carrying their code and state. A foundational platform in mobile agent history.
Voyager
ObjectSpace's commercial ORB with mobile agent capabilities. Provided seamless agent mobility with strong typing and remote method invocation. Used in enterprise applications during the late 1990s.
Grasshopper
IKV++ Technologies' mobile agent platform focusing on MASIF (Mobile Agent System Interoperability Facilities) and FIPA compliance. One of the first to address interoperability between different agent systems.
D'Agents (Agent Tcl)
Dartmouth College's multi-language mobile agent system. Supported Tcl, Java, and Scheme. Pioneered research in agent security, resource control, and fault tolerance.
Mole
University of Stuttgart's mobile agent system. Notable for its strong security model and support for both weak and strong mobility. Contributed to understanding agent migration patterns.
Concordia
Mitsubishi Electric's mobile agent framework. Featured itinerary-based agent migration and collaboration support. Used in real-world enterprise information retrieval applications.
Security Tools & Libraries
Essential security tools and cryptographic libraries for protecting mobile agents and host systems.
- Code integrity during migration
- State confidentiality
- Protection against malicious hosts
- Sandboxing untrusted agents
- Resource access control
- Preventing denial of service
Java Cryptography Architecture
Java's built-in framework for cryptographic operations. Provides encryption, digital signatures, message digests, key generation, and secure random number generation essential for agent security.
Bouncy Castle
Comprehensive cryptography APIs supporting 100+ algorithms. Provides implementations for TLS, PKCS, CMS, ECC, and post-quantum cryptography. Essential for advanced security requirements.
Java Keytool
Command-line utility for managing Java keystores and X.509 certificates. Essential for code signing, establishing trust chains, and secure agent deployment in production environments.
Java Security Manager
Controls access to system resources through policy-based security. Creates sandboxes for untrusted agents, limiting file access, network operations, and system calls. (Note: Deprecated in JDK 17+)
SSL/TLS (JSSE)
Java Secure Socket Extension provides secure communication channels. Essential for protecting agent migration data and inter-agent communication from eavesdropping and tampering.
JAAS
Java Authentication and Authorization Service provides pluggable authentication modules and role-based access control. Enables fine-grained permissions for agent operations.
Code Signing
Digital signatures verify agent code integrity and authenticity. Signed agents can prove their origin and ensure code hasn't been modified during migration.
Oblivious Hashing
Research technique for protecting agent execution integrity. Allows detection of unauthorized modifications to agent code without revealing the verification mechanism.
Trusted Computing
Hardware-based security using TPM (Trusted Platform Module). Provides secure boot, remote attestation, and sealed storage for protecting agents on untrusted hosts.
Academic Resources
Conferences, journals, and research papers on mobile agents and multi-agent systems.
AAMAS
International Conference on Autonomous Agents and Multiagent Systems - The premier venue for research on agents, covering theory, engineering, applications, and interdisciplinary approaches.
JAAMAS
Journal of Autonomous Agents and Multi-Agent Systems - Springer journal covering theoretical and practical aspects of agents, including architectures, security, and applications.
ATAL/EUMAS
International Workshop on Agent Theories, Architectures, and Languages. European workshop focusing on theoretical foundations of agent systems and methodologies.
Mobile Agent Security
Foundational papers on mobile agent security including Sander & Tschudin's "Protecting Mobile Agents Against Malicious Hosts" and Chess's security taxonomy.
Mobile Agents Survey Papers
Comprehensive survey papers covering mobile agent platforms, applications, security challenges, and evolution of the technology from 1995 to present.
PhD Research
Collection of doctoral dissertations on mobile agent systems, security mechanisms, and distributed computing applications across major universities.
Learning Resources
Books, courses, tutorials, and communities for learning about mobile agents and multi-agent systems.
An Introduction to MultiAgent Systems
Michael Wooldridge's definitive textbook (2nd Edition). Covers rational agents, multi-agent environments, communication, cooperation, and distributed AI fundamentals.
Mobile Agents and Security
Giovanni Vigna's edited volume covering the security aspects of mobile code and mobile agents. Essential reading for understanding agent protection mechanisms.
Programming Multi-Agent Systems in AgentSpeak using Jason
Practical guide to implementing BDI agents. Covers AgentSpeak language, Jason platform, and building intelligent autonomous agents.
JADE Programming Guide
Official JADE documentation with tutorials covering agent creation, behaviors, communication, ontologies, and deployment. Includes working code examples.
Stanford CS221
Artificial Intelligence: Principles and Techniques. Covers agent-based AI concepts including search, MDPs, reinforcement learning, and multi-agent decision making.
MIT Distributed Systems
MIT 6.824 Distributed Systems - Covers fundamental concepts applicable to mobile agents including RPC, consensus, fault tolerance, and distributed coordination.
AgentLink
European Coordination Action for Agent-Based Computing. Network of researchers, resources, and roadmaps for agent technology advancement.
SPADE Quick Start
Python-based tutorial for building multi-agent systems with SPADE. Modern async approach using Python's asyncio and XMPP messaging.
Multi-Agent Systems Course
University lectures on YouTube covering multi-agent systems theory, game theory, mechanism design, and coordination protocols.
Related Technologies
Modern technologies that share concepts with mobile agents or address similar distributed computing challenges.
Mobile Agents vs. Modern Paradigms
| Aspect | Mobile Agents | Containers/Serverless |
|---|---|---|
| Mobility | Code + state migration | Static deployment, data moves |
| Autonomy | Fully autonomous decisions | Orchestrator-controlled |
| State | Carries execution state | Typically stateless |
| Communication | Peer-to-peer, asynchronous | API-based, synchronous |
Docker
Container platform providing portable, isolated execution environments. Like mobile agents, Docker enables "write once, run anywhere" but focuses on infrastructure rather than autonomous behavior.
Kubernetes
Container orchestration for automating deployment, scaling, and management. Provides service discovery and load balancing - similar to agent directory services.
AWS Lambda
Function-as-a-Service platform executing code in response to events. Code moves to compute resources automatically, echoing mobile agent's data-to-code paradigm.
Apache Spark
Distributed computing framework for big data. Moves computation to data (like mobile agents) using RDDs and lazy evaluation for efficient distributed processing.
Apache Kafka
Distributed event streaming platform enabling asynchronous communication patterns at scale. Supports decoupled agent-like communication with guaranteed delivery.
Edge Computing
Computing paradigm bringing computation closer to data sources at network edge. Reduces latency and bandwidth - the same motivation behind mobile agents.
Microservices
Architectural pattern structuring applications as loosely coupled services. Each service is autonomous like agents, communicating through well-defined APIs.
WebAssembly (WASM)
Portable binary instruction format enabling near-native code execution anywhere. Provides sandboxed execution similar to mobile agent security models.
Akka
Toolkit for building concurrent, distributed, and fault-tolerant systems using the Actor model. Actors are autonomous, communicate via messages - very similar to agents.