Combining multi-agent model, SOA and ontologies in a distributed and interoperable architecture to manage multi-site production projects

Abstract

Today, production projects are often achieved by multi-site production and the associated markets become more and more dynamic and service oriented. In this context, the multi-site project management is a difficult task, which has to take into account not only the decision distribution and the information confidentiality, but also the heterogeneity existing between different production management systems used by partners. The generic planning model SCEP (supervisor, customer, environment, producer) based on multi-agent technology offers a well-adapted solution to the decision distribution and information confidentiality in project management. SCEP was integrated with ontological mechanisms and SOA (serviceoriented architecture) components in a new architecture Semantic-SCEPSOA, which makes it possible to achieve a distributed and interoperable management of multi-site production projects. In the case of two sites managed by two different planning software applications, the semantic interoperability effectiveness is shown within the S-SCEPSOA architecture.