Towards a Generic Testing Framework for Agent-Based Simulation Models.

Abstract

Agent-based modeling and simulation (ABMS) had an increasing attention during the last decade. However, the weak validation and verification of agent-based simulation models makes ABMS hard to trust. There is no comprehensive tool set for verification and validation of agent-based simulation models which demonstrates that inaccuracies exist and/or which reveals the existing errors in the model. Moreover, on the practical side, there are many ABMS frameworks in use. In this sense, we designed and developed a generic testing framework for agent-based simulation models to conduct validation and verification of models. This paper presents our testing framework in detail and demonstrates its effectiveness by showing its applicability on a realistic agent-based simulation case study.