A preliminary comparative feature analysis of multi-agent systems development methodologies

While there are a considerable number of software engineering methodologies for developing multi-agent systems, not much work has been reported on the evaluation and comparison of these methodologies. This paper presents a comparative analysis of five well-known MAS-development methodologies. The comparison is based on a feature analysis framework published previously. This framework allows the comparative analysis to be made on a variety of evaluation criteria, covering both agent-oriented aspects and system engineering dimensions. The analysis also compares the methodologies in terms of their support for the steps in the development process and for agent-oriented concept modeling. © Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg 2005