Intelligent agents and personal electronics

Conveys a broad view of the role of agents in the personal electronics of the future, and of some of the technical ideas which make this role possible. I start out by sketching out a view of the future based on current trends, principally the convergence of technologies known as multimedia. I then explain why the concept of agents is so important in enabling this view of the future to come about, before describing the main characteristics of the agent model we have adopted in our research at Sharp Laboratories of Europe. To conclude, I comment on the appearance of agent-based products