Autonomous Agents on the Edge of Things

This paper describes a demonstration setup that integrates cognitive agents with the latest W3C standardization efforts for the Web of Things (WoT). The conceptual foundations of the implemented system are the integration of cognitive agent abstractions with W3C Web Things, which are generic abstractions of devices and virtual services that provide agents with various interaction affordances (e.g., actions, events). Together with the W3C WoT Scripting API, which is an ECMAScript-compatible API for W3C WoT environments, these standards allow JavaScript-based agents to be deployed and to operate in heterogeneous WoT environments. The agents can then be effectively distributed across the physical-virtual space in a write once, run anywhere manner: we deploy agents across a heterogeneous information system landscape that includes Web servers, browser-based front-ends, and constrained devices (microcontrollers). The deployment only requires minor platform-specific adjustments to consider resource and performance limitations on constrained devices. As a running example, we demonstrate a semiautonomous assembly scenario with human-in-the-loop support.