This programmer’s guide is complemented by the administrator’s guide and the HTML documentation available in the directory jade/doc. If and where conflict arises between what is reported in the HTML documentation and this guide, preference should be given to the HTML documentation that is updated more frequently. JADE (Java Agent Development Framework) is a software development framework aimed at developing multi-agent systems and applications conforming to FIPA standards for intelligent agents. It includes two main products: a FIPA-compliant agent platform and a package to develop Java agents. JADE has been fully coded in Java and an agent programmer, in order to exploit the framework, should code his/her agents in Java, following the implementation guidelines described in this programmer’s guide.

This guide supposes the reader to be familiar with the FIPA standards1, at least with the Agent Management specifications (FIPA no. 23), the Agent Communication Language, and the ACL Message Structure (FIPA no. 61). JADE is written in Java language and is made of various Java packages, giving application programmers both ready-made pieces of functionality and abstract interfaces for custom, application dependent tasks. Java was the programming language of choice because of its many attractive features, particularly geared towards object-oriented programming in distributed heterogeneous environments; some of these features are Object Serialization, Reflection API and Remote Method Invocation (RMI).

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