Toward semantic interoperability in agent-based coalition command systems

Abstract

The Coalition Agents Experiment (CoAX) is an international collaboration carried out under the auspices of DARPA's Control of Agent-Based Systems (CoABS) programme. The overall aim of CoAX is to demonstrate how an agent-enabled infrastructure, based upon the CoABS Grid, can enhance interoperability between heterogeneous components, including actual military systems, in a realistic scenario. The scenario is based on a peace-enforcement operation in the year 2012 in `Binni' (a mythical state in Africa) which requires a mix of Coalition forces to work together. The agent infrastructure allows the construction of a coalition command support system, with agents grouped into domains to reflect real-world organisational and national boundaries. Each domain is a community of agents that has its own secure communications, capabilities and information spaces, and is governed by policies at the domain, host, virtual machine and agent levels. Communications between agents, whilst given some minimal semantic grounding via the use of conversation policies, should in future utilise emerging Semantic Web technology. In particular, the Resource Description Framework (RDF) and the DARPA Agent Mark-up Language (DAML) promise to deliver a greater degree of semantic interoperability. This paper describes practical experiences taking initial steps towards this goal, implementing agents that use a query language to exchange data between RDF models and implementing a prototype RDF browser. We discuss the specific requirements for querying, merging and attributing of RDF data by agents in a coalition environment, and the particular restrictions affecting agents on controlled networks, rather than on the Web. Finally, some challenges and requirements for the future are outlined.