Software agent

In computer science, a software agent is software that acts as an agent for another as in a relationship of agency. When several agents act they may form a multi-agent system.

Related Topics:
Computer science - Agency - Multi-agent system

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Some software agents are claimed to be autonomous being self-contained and capable of making independent decisions and taking actions to satisfy internal goals based upon their perceived environment. Such claims are controversial. All software agents in important applications are closely supervised by people who start them up, monitor and continually modify their behavior, and shut them down when necessary. Adaptive software agents are refered to as intelligent agents.

Related Topics:
Autonomous - Intelligent agent

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For software agents to work together efficiently they must share semantics of their data elements. This can be done by having computer systems publish their metadata.

Related Topics:
Semantics - Metadata

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