XML-based agent communications for plant automation

The agent communications are basis for agent coordination, cooperation, competition, and task-performing. Agent communication languages (ACLs) provide a high-level, flexible and general model for agent communications. XML is much more useful to integrate and exchange the information in the heterogeneous environment, which can be used to describe the task information, equipment information, etc. The information expressed in XML and wrapped inside the content of KQML message is transmitted between agents. The receiver agent can easily understand the intension of sender agent and get the attributes of the communicative acts. The combination of KQML and XML provides a possible solution for the heterogeneousness and interoperation of MAS.