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Multi-Agent Management of Joint Schedules
S. Smith, A.T. Gallagher, T.L. Zimmerman, L. Barbulescu, and Z. Rubinstein
Proceedings of the 2006 AAAI Spring Symposium on Distributed Plan and Schedule Management, AAAI Press, March, 2006.

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In this paper, we describe an incremental scheduling framework designed to support joint management of inter-dependent schedules by multiple executing agents. We assume an uncertain execution environment and a distributed representation of the overall problem and schedule such that no single agent has a complete view. Hence as unexpected execution events force changes to individual agent schedules, agents must recognize inter-dependencies and coordinate to revise schedules in a way that continues to maximize the quality of their joint activities. Our approach combines an underly- ing flexible-times representation of the schedule, which exploits temporal flexibility to absorb executional un- certainty and insulate dependencies across agent sched- ules, with an incremental approach to schedule revision, which promotes solution stability and tends to minimize the ripple effect of change across agent schedules. We summarize basic mechanisms for constructing and re- vising schedules, for integrating scheduling with exe- cution and for generating options to focus coordination with other agents. Our framework is being developed and applied within the DARPA Coordinators program.

Associated center: CIMDS
Associated lab/group: Intelligent Coordination and Logistics Laboratory
Associated project: Coordinators

Number of pages: 8

S. Smith, A.T. Gallagher, T.L. Zimmerman, L. Barbulescu, and Z. Rubinstein, "Multi-Agent Management of Joint Schedules," Proceedings of the 2006 AAAI Spring Symposium on Distributed Plan and Schedule Management, AAAI Press, March, 2006.

@inproceedings{Smith_2006_5394,
   author = "Stephen Smith and Anthony T Gallagher and Terry Lyle Zimmerman and Laura Barbulescu and Zack Rubinstein",
   title = "Multi-Agent Management of Joint Schedules",
   booktitle = "Proceedings of the 2006 AAAI Spring Symposium on Distributed Plan and Schedule Management",
   month = "March",
   year = "2006",
   publisher = "AAAI Press"
}