Interval Based Integrated Real-Time Coordination For Multi-Agent Systems

Real-time computations in agent based simulations and (serious) games possess an inherent element of temporal relationships as well as time constraints for their performance and utility measures. Such time relationships and temporal constraints can be observed in individual agent behaviors as well as coordination process involving multiple agent. The temporal relationships and time constraints in multi-agent coordination come in terms of message passing, resource management and negotiations. The idea behind such temporal relationships and time constraints is to efficiently handle complex interactions as different patterns of coordination emerge as per the updated situations under certain time durations. Here we propose our position about integrating both dimensions of individual and collective coordination in a unified manner where the coordination patterns are expressed through Allen's interval paradigm. We also introduce concept of "timers" to ensure real-time with explicit expressiveness of the interval paradigm.