Minutes of the AgentLink General Management Committee Meeting Held in Brussels on Thursday 30 April 1998 Present: (CHAIR) Michael Wooldridge (coordinator & general chair) Donald Steiner (WP1 coordinator) Yves Demazeau (WP2 coordinator) Gerhard Weiss (WP3 coordinator) Norman Sadeh (ESPRIT project officer) 1. Welcome [MJW + NS] MJW formally welcomed the members of the management committee to the first official AL meeting. NS congratulated the management committee on coming this far, and stressed several points that he felt were vital to the future success of the network, the most important of which being the need to keep the network open and ensure that the community felt that this was a network in which they played a part. He also stressed that networks of excellence can play an important role in shaping the future of EC funding in areas such as agents. 2. Summary of state of play [MJW] At the time of the meeting, the contract had been signed by QMW and returned to the commission. [It has since been signed and returned by the commission.] The official start date for the project is 30 April 1998. Funding is 400 KECU, for 18 months initially. 3. WP1: Industrial action [DS] DS reported on the following: Task 1.1 (industrial meetings). DS proposed visits to the following meetings: * FIPA meeting, July 1998 in Dublin, Ireland. This was felt by all to be a good opportunity of killing 2 birds with 1 stone, viz raising awareness of AgentLink amongst the (significant) industrial membership of FIPA, and also of supporting standardisation activities (an important AL task). DS requested funding for this meeting of between 4 and 6 KECU, which was agreed in principle. DS to come back with a concrete proposal on the allocation of this funding. * Agents World, July 1998 in Paris, France. Some concern was expressed that this might not have a strong industrial focus, but YD assured the committee this was not the case. YD agreed that a stall at Agents World would be provided for AgentLink. (See also the requests for conference support, below.) * ECAI-98, August 1998 in Brighton, UK. MJW will be attending this, and will represent the network there. An exhibition stall costs GBP 450 (approx 720 ECU). MJW agreed to investigate the possibiity of sharing a stall with another network. Task 1.2 (database of products etc). DS proposed that a questionnairre should be distributed to all members to solicit such information. MJW added that an online registration for such information might be helpful. DS to prepare a questionnairre. NS recommended that the experience of other NoEs should be taken into account, appropriate contacts will be provided. T1.3 (SIGs). No SIGs proposals were received specifically directed at industry component. However, 2 e-commerce-based SIG proposals were received from Carles Sierra and Aldo Dragoni, but these were sent to the research coordinator. It was felt that these should be more in industry area. It was strongly felt by all present that an e-commerce SIG was a good idea. NS stressed importance of coordinating such a SIG with other EC e-commerce activities, in particular with Paul Timmers, who is responsible for such activities at the EC. In addition, the committee strongly felt that a methodologies/spftware engineering SIG would be a good thing. MJW reported that Jan Treur (Vrije University Amsterdam) had expressed an interest in managing such a SIG, but had not generated a proposal. DS to chase this up. DS stated goal of getting e-commerce and methodology SIGs established by end of June 1998, with 1st meetings targetted for July if possible. T1.4 (inter-node visits). It was generally felt that the amount of money available for these made them scarcely worthwhile -- NS suggested strongly that the money woud be better spent on another SIG, and after some lengthy discussion, it was agreed to reallocate the money to potential SIGs. T1.5 (standardisation activities). It was noted that AL would be directly supporting such activities (T1.1, above). MJW pointed out that an important role of AL was to keep the community informed of current activities, and that organisations such as FIPA might therefore want to submit regular reports to the newsletter on their activities. DS agreed this would be a good idea and will contact FIPA correspondingly. Also other standardisation activities should be taken into consideration (e.g., W3C, OMG, etc). 4. WP2: Research Coordination YD noted that a detailed set of milestones for this WP had been generated and sent to MJW. T2.1 (research database). Following from the suggestion of DS, YD proposed a questionnairre to find out the research expertise of each site. MJW again pointed out that this could be done online, via the WWW site. YD proposed that AL could act as a kind of "matchmaker" between sites working in closely related areas. T2.2 (SIGs) There was some discussion on the criteria to be used for supporting SIGs. After some discussion, it was decided to adopt the following: i/ Not too narrow focus -- of broad general interest. ii/ Has real potential for generating new collaborations and projects that have a realistic chance of ultimately being funded. iii/ Should have at least as much industrial relevance as a typical ESPRIT LTR proposal. Some discussion took place on the proposals received. The most promising of these were felt to be the e-commerce SIGs, but that these were better dealt with under the industry SIG. YD to get back in touch with other proposers of SIGs and inform them of the guidelines for accepting SIGs. As with WP1, the goal is to establish SIGs by end June 1998. T2.3 (database of research materials). YD to put ICMAS abstracts at disposal of AL, and also to ensure that any SIG publications were put online. It was suggested that further steps would be useful to ensure that a true research database was established. YD to investigate. T2.4 (support for conferences). Some discussion on the criteria to be used for supporting conferences. In the end, it was decided that a proposal for support should include: i/ A statement on how support would be used. ii/ A draft call for papers for the conference. ii/ A statement on the organisation of the conference. iii/ A draft budget. iv/ A statement on how AL will be presented at the conference (e.g., a stall?) The following criteria were suggested as useful for deciding whether to support the event: i/ Would support give real *added value* to the event? It is not AL's purpose to support events that do not need it. If the event could be self-financing, then it is not clear why AL should support it! ii/ Only events taking place in the EU could be supported. iii/ Is at least 50% of the event of relevance to AL? iv/ Would AL be satisfactorily acknowledged? v/ Could any profits be used to recover AL costs? YD then presented a request for 15KECU funding from the "Agents World" event to be held in Paris. It was generally felt that this was a very large sum of money, but that "Agents World" would clearly be the largest agent-related event to be held in Europe during the first 18 months of the network. After some discussion, it was therefore agreed to support "Agents World" in this way, but that no further funds would be made available. YD noted that the break-even point for the conference was 300 delegates, and that any "profits" made over and above this would be returned to AL, up to the 15KECU value of support. T2.5 (support for inter-node visits). NS noted that the money available for such visits was comparatively small, and that this money might therefore be more usefully chanelled into supporting more SIGs. After some discussion, this point was agreed. 5. WP3: Teaching and training. GW noted that WP3 is the smallest (in financial terms) of the work packages, and that the major event in this WP (the sumer school) was some way off. However, the need to start thinking about this event was readily apparent. NS suggested that co-locating the summer school with IJCAI-99 would make it easier to attract first-rate non-EU speakers, who might otherwise not travel to Europe. GW to investigate. Another possibility is to send out a call for hosting the summer school, and give the opportuity for AgentLink members to bid. Criteria to support courses, etc, were regarded as similar to those for support of conferences & workshops (WP2). A questionnaire is under development by GW for teaching & training materials. 6. WP4: Management & Infrastructure MJW noted that the AgentLink.org domain name had been registered, and a provisional WWW site already established. The WWW site plans to "go live" on 1st July 1998 (although a provisional site is already present). Work was underway to establish mailing lists for each of the WPs, as well as a general mailing list for all members. MJW noted that he would prepare the first newsletter, but would like to hand-off to someone else after this. Delivery date for 1st issue of newsletter is July 1st. NS suggested that the newsletter be produced and shipped from a country with low production and shipping costs. 7. Consideration of membership requests [MJW] More than 70 requests for membership were received prior to the meeting; it was impossible to consider them at the meeting. Some discussion therefore took place on the criteria to be used for allowing membership, so that MJW could make decisions back in London. In general, it was stressed that members should be *active*, and not merely dormant observers. MJW noted that several organisations explicitly wanted to be merely observers. NS suggested an "associate member" status for such organisations, so that they could, e.g., receive the newsletter, but would not take any more active role in the network. MJW to work on the proposals offline, and get back to the management committee. The requests were distriburted to the management committee offline, comments welcomed. 8. Finances [MJW] QMW have already started to generate spreadsheets for handling finances. MJW to generate concrete instructions for claiming back expenses. NS advised MJW to ensure that an ECU account was created to handle the AL account, and MJW agreed to do this. 9. Review of action items [MJW] DS: * get concrete proposal for FIPA meeting support * get list of other possible industrial meetings to attend * contact Carles/Aldo with respect to organising e-commerce SIG * generate questionairre for products/services/etc * get in touch with OMG/XML/W3C organisations to let them know about AL, and request reports on activities * generate list of milestones & dates for WP1 YD: * generate questionaire for research expertise database * report on progress for T2.1 MJW: * give DS email address for Thomas Magedanz, re OMG standards * questionnairre to AL members, to find out what activities they want to see * establish ECU account for AL at QMW * email NS with ICMAS request for support 10. Date & location of next meeting [MJW] It was agreed to hold the next management committee meeting the day after the "Agents World" event in Paris, ie., Wednesday 8 July 1998. The meeting will be held in Paris. It was also decided to hold a general meeting of "AgentLink" at the same time.