Title: Service computing and agents paradigm for managing distributed information sources

Authors: Hakima Mellah; Salima Hassas; Habiba Drias

Addresses: Research Center in Scientific and Technical Information – CERIST, Information Systems and Multimedia Systems Department, 5 rue des 3 frères Aissou, Ben Aknoun, BP 143, 16030, Algiers, Algeria; High School of Computing – ESI, BP 68M Oued Smar, 16309, El Harrach Algiers, Algeria ' Claude Bernard University, Liesp, Bat Nautibus, 43 Bd du 11 Novembre 1918, 69622 Villeurbanne Cedex, Lyon, France ' Research Laboratory in Artifical Intelligence (LRIA), Houari Boumediene University, USTHB, BP 32 El Alia Bab Ezzouar 16 111 Algiers, Algeria

Abstract: Information gathered from several distributed and interconnected sources is subject to high complexity and may lack relevance if not considered as a whole, with a systemic view. In this context, information source content is strongly related to other information sources contents to which it is connected. The content itself may have several meanings following its use purpose. And finally, the way information sources are connected to each other, may have an important impact on the gathered information. A model is proposed, where its highlighting point is to contribute to information system agility by defining a three-dimensional view considering content, use and structure in the same framework. This exhibits information complexity and the interest of methodologies based on self-organised principles to manage the complexity. The contribution is mainly focused on presenting some factors that lead to self-organisation in a service-oriented architecture (SOA). It shows how it can be possible, through agents' paradigm, to integrate the associated mechanisms in this context.

Keywords: information systems; information management; service-oriented architecture; SOA; self-organisation; agility; complexity; MAS; multi-agent systems; agent-based systems.

DOI: 10.1504/IJBIS.2013.054169

International Journal of Business Information Systems, 2013 Vol.13 No.1, pp.91 - 115

Published online: 30 Aug 2013 *

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