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<article-title>Unifying Distributed Constraint Algorithms in a BDI Negotiation Framework</article-title>
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<author><a href="mailto:ledi0002@ntu.edu.sg"><name>Bao Chau Le Dinh</name></a></author>
<aff>School of Computer Engineering<br/> Nanyang Technological University Republic of Singapore</aff>

<author><a href="mailto:asktseow@ntu.edu.sg"><name>Kiam Tian Seow</name></a></author>
<aff>School of Computer Engineering <br/>Nanyang Technological University Republic of Singapore</aff>
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<title>ABSTRACT</title>
<p>This paper presents a novel, unified distributed constraint satisfaction framework based on automated negotiation. The Distributed Constraint Satisfaction Problem (DCSP) is one that entails several agents to search for an agreement, which is a consistent combination of actions that satisfies their mutual constraints
in a shared environment. By anchoring the DCSP search on
automated negotiation, we show that several well-known DCSP
algorithms are actually mechanisms that can reach agreements
through a common Belief-Desire-Intention (BDI) protocol, but
using different strategies. A major motivation for this BDI framework is that it not only provides a conceptually clearer understanding of existing DCSP algorithms from an agent model perspective, but also opens up the opportunities to extend and develop new strategies for DCSP. To this end, a new strategy called
<italic>Unsolicited Mutual Advice</italic> (UMA) is proposed. Performance evaluation shows that the UMA strategy can outperform some exist-
ing mechanisms in terms of computational cycles.</p>
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