A Framework for Evaluating Agent-Oriented Methodologies

Multiple agent-oriented methodologies were introduced in recent years, however no systematic evaluation of these was offered. As a result, it is difficult to select a methodology for a specific project. Additionally, there are no means for determining what the advantages and drawbacks of each methodology are. To resolve these problems, we devise a framework for evaluating and comparing agent-oriented methodologies. This framework focuses on four major aspects of a methodology: concepts and properties, notations and modeling techniques, process, and pragmatics. We demonstrate the usage of the suggested framework by evaluating the GAIA methodology. As sought, this evaluation identifies the strengths and the weaknesses of GAIA, thus exemplifying the capabilities of our framework