FOUNDATION FOR INTELLIGENT PHYSICAL AGENTS

FIPA Subscribe Communicative Act Specification

Document title	FIPA Subscribe Communicative Act Specification
Document number	DC00060A	Document source	FIPA TC C
Document status	Deprecated	Date of this status	2000/10/16
Supersedes	None
Contact	fab@fipa.org
Change history
2000/10/16	Deprecated by FIPA00037

Geneva, Switzerland

Notice

Use of the technologies described in this specification may infringe patents, copyrights or other intellectual property rights of FIPA Members and non-members. Nothing in this specification should be construed as granting permission to use any of the technologies described. Anyone planning to make use of technology covered by the intellectual property rights of others should first obtain permission from the holder(s) of the rights. FIPA strongly encourages anyone implementing any part of this specification to determine first whether part(s) sought to be implemented are covered by the intellectual property of others, and, if so, to obtain appropriate licenses or other permission from the holder(s) of such intellectual property prior to implementation. This specification is subject to change without notice. Neither FIPA nor any of its Members accept any responsibility whatsoever for damages or liability, direct or consequential, which may result from the use of this specification.

Foreword

The Foundation for Intelligent Physical Agents (FIPA) is an international organization that is dedicated to promoting the industry of intelligent agents by openly developing specifications supporting interoperability among agents and agent-based applications. This occurs through open collaboration among its member organizations, which are companies and universities that are active in the field of agents. FIPA makes the results of its activities available to all interested parties and intends to contribute its results to the appropriate formal standards bodies.

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The FIPA specifications are developed through direct involvement of the FIPA membership. The status of a specification can be either Preliminary, Experimental, Standard, Deprecated or Obsolete. More detail about the process of specification may be found in the FIPA Procedures for Technical Work. A complete overview of the FIPA specifications and their current status may be found in the FIPA List of Specifications. A list of terms and abbreviations used in the FIPA specifications may be found in the FIPA Glossary.

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Contents

1 Scope. 1

2 Subscribe. 2

3 References. 3

1 Scope

This document specifies the Subscribe communicative act which is compliant to [FIPA00037] requirements.

2 Subscribe

Summary	The act of requesting a persistent intention to notify the sender of the value of a reference, and to notify again whenever the object identified by the reference changes.
Content	A descriptor (a referential expression).
Description	The subscribe act is a persistent version of the query-ref act (see [FIPA00054]), such that the agent receiving the subscribe will inform (see [FIPA00046]) the sender of the value of the reference, and will continue to send further informs if the object denoted by the description changes.
Formal Model	<i, subscribe(j, Ref x d(x))> º <i, request-whenever(j, <j, inform-ref(i, Ref x d(x))>, ($y) B_j ((Ref x d(x) = y))> FP: B_i a Ù ØB_i (Bif_j a Ú Uif_j a) RE: B_j a Where: a= I_i Done(<j, inform-ref(i, Ref x d(x))>, ($e) Enables(e, ($y) B_j ((Ref x d(x) = y))) Note: Ref x d(x) is one of the referential expressions: ix d(x), any x d(x) or all x d(x).
Example	Agent i wishes to be updated on the exchange rate of Francs to Dollars, and makes a subscription agreement with j (an exchange rate server). (subscribe :sender i :receiver j :content (iota ?x (= ?x (xch-rate FFr USD))))

3 References

[FIPA00037] FIPA Communicative Act Library Specification. Foundation for Intelligent Physical Agents, 2000. http://www.fipa.org/specs/fipa00037/

[FIPA00046] FIPA Inform Communicative Act Specification. Foundation for Intelligent Physical Agents, 2000. http://www.fipa.org/specs/fipa00046/

[FIPA00054] FIPA Query Ref Communicative Act Specification. Foundation for Intelligent Physical Agents, 2000. http://www.fipa.org/specs/fipa00054/