RETSINA SEMANTIC WEB CALENDAR AGENT

R   E   T   S   I   N   A      A   I         T   e   c   h   n   o   l   o   g   y

Integrates RETSINA AI Technology with Microsoft Outlook 2000
Navigates the Semantic Web

Intelligent Software Agents Laboratory
The Robotics Institute
Carnegie-Mellon University

Options and Settings

The options property sheet allows the user to configure RCAL, and to enable or disable services such as remote browser invocation or distributed meeting scheduling [DMS]. The sheet can be viewed by selecting the Options button on the Current Events Browser, or by selecting the Options menu entry from the System Tray Icon Menu.

• General Settings
  • Enable Balloon ToolTips - Enable or disable the help balloon tooltips associated with many of the agent controls. These provide additional assistance for the novice user; however advanced users may prefer not to have them enabled.
  • Minimize Agent at Startup - By default, the Current Events Browser appears when the agent is started. By selecting this option, this browser will be minimized when the agent starts. This is useful if the agent is started automatically when the user logs in or starts their PC.
  • Switch on Debug Mode - The debug window provides communication debugging information, and displays meeting negotiation information and (soon) Semantic Web reasoning. Once enabled, the debugging window may be closed by disabling this setting, or by clicking the Close and DisableDebug Mode button on the Debug window.
• Agent Automation
  • Enable Autonomous Schedule Import - Allow external agent requests to instruct the agent to import a Semantic Web Schedule into the user's appointment list in MS Outlook. The format of the agent request is described in the Agent Interaction (Message Formats) section. This is disabled by default.
  • Enable Autonomous Invocation of Schedule Browser - Allow external agent requests to instruct the agent to display a specified schedule with the Semantic Web Browser. The format of the agent request is described in the Agent Interaction (Message Formats) section. This is disabled by default.
• Meeting Scheduling
  • Disable Distributed Meeting Scheduling - Disable any form of meeting scheduling, including outgoing requests from the Agent, meeting requests from an Electronic Secretary, or from other agents.
  • Only Schedule Meetings requested by known contacts (default) - Only honor incomming meeting requests from individuals who appear in the user's MS Outlook contact list.
  • Schedule all Meeting Requests - Honor and schedule all incomming meeting requests if possible.

• Notify me when an Appointment Reminder is generated - If enabled, a notification will be sent to the user whenever a reminder or alarm is generated for a meeting. These reminders are handled by the MS Outlook Reminder mechanism, and hence may be generated through Semantic Web Calendar Alarms, Scheduled Meeting reminders or from traditional MS Outlook Appointment reminders.
• Notify me when a new meeting has been scheduled - If enabled, a notification will be sent whenever a new meeting has been scheduled. There are two types of notifications that may be generated:
  • Short Notifications - These are very brief, one line messages, suitable for PDAs, Short Message Service (SMS) notifications or phone email messages.
  • Long Notifications - These longer notifications include additional information about the meeting, including agent negotiation traces.
• Tell me about all autonomous schedule imports - This generates notifications whenever an agent automation request is received, such as a request to Import Schedules or to invoke the Schedule Browser.

To communicate with other agents, an Agent needs to be registered with an Agent Naming Service, or ANS. An ANS is provided by the Intelligent Software Agents Laboratory, although any compatable ANS could be used. If the Agent is unregistered, then all interactions with other agents will be disabled, such as meeting scheduling, and invocation requests. However, email based notifications will still be enabled, and the Semantic Web Browser can be used to browse and import Semantic Web schedules.

By default, the Calendar Agent name is constructed from the user's email address (the "@" character is replaced with the "_" character for ANS compatability), by appending "-CalendarAgent". So, for example, joe@any.com would have the agent name joe_any.com-CalendarAgent. This policy is also used by the distributed meeting scheduler, when no other information is available about the user's Calendar Agent name.

The ANS provided by the Intelligent Software Agents Laboratory is hosted on www.daml.ri.cmu.edu on port 6677.

Return to the Semantic Web Calendar Parser Home Page