Re: SwarmFest Abstract

[Matthew E. Gaston]

Is there an associated paper for this presentation?

Thanks,
Matt

On Tue, 13 Feb 2001, M Lang / S Railsback wrote:

-->Marcus: Glen says he is willing to present this at SwarmFest. He
-->presented a similar talk at our Ecological Society symposium on
-->individual-based modeling last summer; we are now turning it into a
-->paper for the journal Natural Resource Modeling.
-->
-->Steve R.
-->
-->Software Engineering Considerations for Agent-based Models
-->
-->Glen Ropella, Steve Railsback, & Steve Jackson
-->
-->ABSTRACT. Software design is much more important for agent-based models
-->(ABMs) than it is for conventional models, for three reasons. (1) The
-->results of an ABM are the emergent properties of a system of interacting
-->agents that exist only in the software; unlike analytical model results,
-->an ABM's outcomes can be reproduced only by exactly reproducing its
-->software implementation. (2) Outcomes of an ABM are expected to be
-->complex and novel, making software errors difficult to identify. (3) An
-->ABM needs 'systems software' that manages populations of multiple kinds
-->of agents, often has nonlinear and multi-threaded process control, and
-->simulates a wide range of physical and biological processes. We provide
-->seven general software guidelines for complex models are especially
-->important for ABMs. We also provide four additional guidelines specific
-->to ABMs. Strategies for meeting these guidelines include planning
-->adequate resources for software development and using tools like Swarm
-->that are designed specifically for ABMs.
-->
-->--
-->address@hidden
-->Lang, Railsback & Assoc.
-->250 California Ave., Arcata CA 95521
-->707-822-0453; Fax 822-1868
-->
-->Until July 1, 2001:
-->     Los Alamos, NM
-->     505-661-4258
-->
-->
-->                  ==================================
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-->


Matthew E. Gaston
UMBC Department of Computer Science
address@hidden
http://www.cs.umbc.edu/~mgasto1



                  ==================================
   Swarm-Modelling is for discussion of Simulation and Modelling techniques
   esp. using Swarm.  For list administration needs (esp. [un]subscribing),
   please send a message to <address@hidden> with "help" in the
   body of the message.
                  ==================================