Knowledge-based support of cooperative activities

A system that is designed to support cooperative activities and the decision-making that is part of them must contain knowledge about the activities, the objects they create and manipulate, and the people or agents who are responsible for their execution. The authors describe such a system, called POLYMER, that emphasizes the use of planning techniques for flexible activity execution and exception handling. The representation of multiagent activities is described in detail, and examples are given of how a negotiation process is used to resolve inconsistencies that arise during activity execution.<>