Agent Framework Project

The Agent Framework is obsolete for now. It was a project worked on before the 0.3 release, and the functions it served have been superceded by WakeupCaller, NotificationFramework and other simpler, dumber features.

Project Summary

Chandler needs a way to perform actions automatically as various conditions arise, and a UI for tracking ongoing activities. The Agent framework accomplishes this using the metaphor of workers in occupational roles, carrying out activities on your behalf.

People who worked on Agent Framework

• StuartParmenter (aka Pavlov)
• AndyHertzfeld
• AndrewFrancis

Recent Decisions

• 24 March 2004: The threading issues, at least as they relate to periodically scheduled activities (such as checking mail, getting RSS feeds, etc), are going to be pushed into a lower layer -- a scheduling manager, or periodic process handler. Stuart's investigating the details of this proposed class(es). The agent plan can later be implemented on top of a generic scheduler. (Lisa)
• 29 March 2004: Chao added that the design team isn't planning to worry about big-A "Agents" for Canoga, or possibly even for Westwood.

Design Documents

• Agent Framework API
• The schema had some Agent Framework info which is now gone (look in CVS history)
• Threads were causing some amount of havoc. Threading Summary covers some of the these issuse, but they all need to be looked into in more detail. Basically, when stuff happens through triggering by some scheduled time or some notification, we need to be clear in our model for what thread that stuff happens in.

-- Last changed -- LisaDusseault - 06 Apr 2005