Distributed Multi-agent Schemes for Predictable QoS on Heterogenous Wireless Networks

In realizing cyber-physical systems, research on developing network supported with predictable Quality of Service (QoS) is extremely important. This study exploits heterogeneous networking as communication medium of cyber physical application using a distributed multi-agent scheme (DMAS). The DMAS is based on the concept of cooperation and the awareness algorithm. The proposed scheme is developed for supporting QoS management which consists of a collection of problem-solving agents with three modules: the knowledge source, the in-cloud blackboard system, and the control engine built into the scheme. A set of problem-solving agents autonomously process local tasks and cooperatively interoperate via an in-cloud blackboard system to guarantee QoS. An awareness algorithm, called the Q-learning algorithm, calculates the exceptive rewards of a handoff to all access networks. These rewards are then used by these problem solving agents to determine what to do. Through operations and cooperation among the active agents, a policy is selected and a user-accepted schedule that meets the specified QoS is generated. In addition, to realize actual results, an integrated test-bed emulation network based on NetFPGA-OpenFlow platform is purposed in this paper.