Oops, I Heard That! Situated Communication with Locality-Aware KQML

In traditional BDI (Belief-Desire-Intention) Multiagent Systems (MAS), agent communication languages such as KQML (Knowledge Query and Manipulation Language) facilitate structured message exchange and are supported by widespread BDI implementations like Jason. However, KQML lacks mechanisms to account for the situatedness of agents within dynamic environments. This paper proposes an extension to KQML, KQML-S, that incorporates the notion of locality, enabling message semantics to adapt based on the agents’ shared context. Specifically, we introduce a framework where agents within the same logical communication space, or “logical room”, perceive indirect updates from interactions occurring within their locality. We present the theoretical foundations of KQML-S and its implementation within VEsNA (Virtual Environments via Natural language Agents), a framework extending Jason with chatbots for natural language interaction, and a Virtual Reality environment implemented in Godot. KQML-S bridges two foundational features of agents: social ability and situatedness. VEsNA agents, being natively situated in Virtual Reality and inheriting KQML communication from Jason, fully exploit the potential of KQML-S and showcase its usefulness in those scenarios where agents are logically or physically embodied in a discrete, “room-based” environment.