Coordination through Joint Intentions in Industrial Multiagent Systems

The responsibility framework was devised specifically for coordinating behavior in complex, unpredictable, and dynamic environments, such as industrial control. In distributed AI (DAI) systems, problem-solving agents cooperate to achieve the goals of the individuals and of the system as a whole. Each individual is capable of a range of identifiable problem-solving activities, has its own aims and objectives, and can communicate with others. Typically, agents within a given system have problem-solving expertise that is related but distinct and that has to be coordinated when solving problems. Such interactions are needed because of the dependencies between agents' actions and the necessity to meet global constraints and because often, no one individual has sufficient competence to solve the entire problem.