Re: [moca] Mobile Agents: Ten reasons for failure

[Pablo Garralda <pablo@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

Here is my subjective and rather unexperienced point of view about Mobile 
Agents and Ambients. :)

> Although it is only two pages long,  the paper contains strong criticisms 
> against
> Mobile Agents (a' la Ambients) advocating simpler form of mobility like: (i) 
> code
> on demand (ie applets) or (ii) upload of code to a server for remote 
> evaluation (a' la Dpi).

My knowledge about Mobile agents is very limited, however I believe the 
point of view Mobile Agent presented here is different than the point of 
view of calculi a' la Ambient. Ambients implicitly assume a common 
infrastructure that supports ambients and their operations. For Mobile 
Agents there are no assumptions whatsoever. Therefore, anything is 
possible. In fact, a mobile ambient is not an autonomous device 
(physically), it is a program, just information and it can be altered 
easily.


> As the title says the paper states 10 reasons for failures of the Mobile 
> Agent paradigm.
> So, it would be interesting to trigger a discussion on it. In particular, 
> from my point
> of view, at least three of those criticisms
>
> 5) Mobile Agents are difficult to authenticate and control

Well, there is Proof Carrying Code to certify the code. Regarding 
authentication, it guess depends on the application domain. A 
authentication mechanism should be provided but establishing the policy is 
a different issue and depends on each specific domain.

> 6) Mobile Agent can be brainwashed

Well, yes. If a mobile agent is considered information, it can be altered 
or simple erased. A cooperative infrastructure is always needed, unless 
the mobile agent has hardware on its own.

> 7) Mobile Agents cannot keep secrets.

Again, they cannot be entrusted with secrets because they can be 
brainwashed, so if an agent is capable to read the secret anybody else 
can.



Best Regards,
Pablo Garralda.


Pablo Garralda
Stevens Institute of Technology
----------------------------------





 
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
The "models for mobility" mailing list     mailto:moca@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
http://www-sop.inria.fr/mimosa/personnel/Davide.Sangiorgi/moca.html