FOUNDATION FOR INTELLIGENT PHYSICAL AGENTS
FIPA Quality of Service Ontology Specification
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Document title |
FIPA Quality of Service Ontology Specification |
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Document number |
XC00094 |
Document source |
FIPA TC Nomadic Application Support |
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Document status |
Experimental |
Date of this status |
2002/11/01 |
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Supersedes |
None |
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Contact |
fab@fipa.org |
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Change history |
Initial version |
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©
1996-2002 Foundation for Intelligent Physical Agents
http://www.fipa.org/
Geneva, Switzerland
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Notice |
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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 where appropriate.
The members of FIPA are individually and collectively committed to open competition in the development of agent-based applications, services and equipment. Membership in FIPA is open to any corporation and individual firm, partnership, governmental body or international organization without restriction. In particular, members are not bound to implement or use specific agent-based standards, recommendations and FIPA specifications by virtue of their participation in FIPA.
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 Document Policy [f-out-00000] and the FIPA Specifications Policy [f-out-00003]. A complete overview of the FIPA specifications and their current status may be found on the FIPA Web site.
FIPA is a non-profit association registered in Geneva, Switzerland. As of June 2002, the 56 members of FIPA represented many countries worldwide. Further information about FIPA as an organization, membership information, FIPA specifications and upcoming meetings may be found on the FIPA Web site at http://www.fipa.org/.
Contents
3.1.1 Quality of Service Description
3.1.6 Communication Channel Description
3.1.7 Transport Protocol Description
3.2.3 Match Quality of Service Information
3.3.1 Not Understood Exception Propositions
3.3.2 Refusal Exception Proposition
This document deals with a Quality of Service ontology. It contains specifications for:
· Defining an ontology for representing the Quality of Service of the FIPA Message Transport Service.
The ability to automatically adjust to changes in a transparent and integrated fashion is essential for nomadicity; nomadic end-users are usually professionals in areas other than computing. Furthermore, today’s mobile computer systems are already very complex to use as productivity tools. Thus, nomadic end-users need all the support that a FIPA agent-based distributed system can deliver and adaptability to the changes in the environment of nomadic end-users is an important issue. To be able to adapt to the changes, an agent must be aware of the changes in the environment.
The fipa-qos ontology can be used by agents when communicating about the Quality of Service (QoS). The ontology provides basic vocabulary for QoS. Additionally, the fipa-qos ontology supports two methods to get QoS information: a single query and a subscription. For example, an agent may query current QoS values from another agent using, for example, the fipa-query interaction protocol [FIPA00027] or the agent may subscribe to notifications when something interesting happens in the QoS using the fipa-subscribe interaction protocol [FIPA00035]. These notifications may be dispatched at a predefined interval or when some changes in the QoS occur. The former mechanism (periodic notification) can be used if the agent wants to be informed about the QoS values on a regular basis, for example the value of the throughput every five seconds. The latter mechanism (on occurrence notification) is useful when the agent does not care about QoS values until something relevant to its task happens. For example, an agent that is sending real-time data may need to be informed, when the throughput value drops below the given threshold.
This section describes a set of frames that represent the classes of objects in the domain of discourse within the framework of the fipa-qos ontology.
The following terms are used to describe the objects of the domain:
· Frame. This is the mandatory name of this entity that must be used to represent each instance of this class.
· Ontology. This is the name of the ontology, whose domain of discourse includes the parameters described in the table.
· Parameter. This is the mandatory name of a parameter of this frame.
· Description. This is a natural language description of the semantics of each parameter.
· Presence. This indicates whether each parameter is mandatory or optional.
· Type. This is the type of the values of the parameter: Integer, Word, String, URL, Term, Set or Sequence.
· Reserved Values. This is a list of FIPA-defined constants that can assume values for this parameter.
This type of object represents the quality of service of the transport protocol or communication channel.
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Frame Ontology |
qos fipa-qos |
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Parameter |
Description |
Presence[1] |
Type |
Reserved Values |
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line-rate |
The bandwidth in one direction over the link. |
Optional
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rate-value |
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throughput |
The number of user data bits successfully transferred in one direction across the link[2]. Successful transfer means that no user data bits are lost, added or inverted in transfer. |
Optional |
rate-value |
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throughput-std-dev |
The current standard deviation of the throughput within a time unit. |
Optional |
rate-value |
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rtt |
The round trip time which is the time required for a data segment to be transmitted to a peer entity and a corresponding acknowledgement sent back to the originating entity. |
Optional |
time-value |
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rtt-std-dev |
The standard deviation of the round-trip time within a time unit. |
Optional |
time-value |
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delay |
The (nominal) time required for a data segment to be transmitted to a peer entity. |
Optional |
time-value |
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delay-std-dev |
The standard deviation of the delay time within a time unit. |
Optional |
time-value |
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mean-up-time |
The expected uptime of an established link. |
Optional |
time-value |
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omission-rate |
The probability that a data segment is not transmitted correctly over a link. |
Optional |
probability-value |
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ber |
The ratio of the number of bit errors to the total number of bits transmitted in a given time interval[3]. |
Optional |
probability-value |
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frame-error-rate |
The probability that a data segment is not transmitted correctly over a link. |
Optional |
probability-value |
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conn-setup-delay |
The (sampled) delay to establish a connection between communicating entities. |
Optional |
time-value |
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conn-setup-failure-prob |
The ratio of total call attempts that result in call setup failure to the total call attempts in a population of interest. |
Optional |
probability-value |
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status |
The connectivity status of the link. connected means that there (at least) logical connection between communicating entities. disconnected means that there is no connection between communicating entities, and the communicating entities are not establishing a connection at the moment. connecting means that there is no connection between communicating entities, but they are currently establishing a connection between them. |
Optional |
word |
connected disconnected connecting |
This type of object represents a data transfer value.
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Frame Ontology |
rate-value fipa-qos |
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Parameter |
Description |
Presence |
Type |
Reserved Values |
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direction |
The direction in which this value is measured. inbound means the data transmission where the actor receives the data, and outbound means the data transmission where the actor transmits the data. |
Mandatory
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word |
inbound outbound |
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unit |
The unit in which the value is represented. bits/s means bits per seconds. kbits/s means kilobits per seconds. One kilobit is 2^10 bits. mbits/s means megabits per second. One megabit is 2^20 bits. gbits/s means gigabits per second. One gigabit is 2^30 bits. |
Mandatory |
word |
gbits/s mbits/s kbits/s bits/s |
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value |
The rate value. |
Mandatory |
number |
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This type of object represents a time value.
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Frame Ontology |
time-value fipa-qos |
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Parameter |
Description |
Presence |
Type |
Reserved Values |
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direction |
The direction in which this value is measured. inbound means the data transmission where the actor receives the data, and outbound means the data transmission where the actor transmits the data. |
Optional[4]
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word |
inbound outbound |
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unit |
The unit in which the value is represented. h means hours, m means minutes, s means seconds, and ms means milliseconds. |
Mandatory |
word |
h m s ms |
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value |
The time value. |
Mandatory |
number |
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This type of object represents a probability value.
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Frame Ontology |
probability-value fipa-qos |
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Parameter |
Description |
Presence |
Type |
Reserved Values |
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direction |
The direction in which this value is measured. inbound means the data transmission where the actor receives the data, and outbound means the data transmission where the actor transmits the data. |
Optional
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word |
inbound outbound |
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value |
The probability value which obeys the following axiom: 0 ≤ value ≤ 1 |
Mandatory |
number |
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This type of object represents the time type of a time value.
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Frame Ontology |
time-type fipa-qos |
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Parameter |
Description |
Presence |
Type |
Reserved Values |
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value |
The value of the time-type.
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Mandatory |
word |
every after |
This type of object represents a communication channel.
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Frame Ontology |