DREAM

1. DREAM Napier University - Scotland University of Dortmund - Germany Ecole Polytechnique - France Leiden University - The Netherlands University of Granada - Spain South Bank University - England

2. People • Ben Paechter Daniele Denaro • Thomas Baeck MikePreuß • Marc Schoenauer Pierre Collet • Gusz Eiben Mark Jelasity • JJ Merelo Maribel Arenas • Terry Fogarty Ming Feng DREAM

3. European CommissionUniversal Information Ecosystems • “The Universal Information Ecosystems (UIE) proactive initiative is aimed at exploring and validating new technologies and scenarios that can turn the complex information infrastructure as it is emerging today into a rich, adaptive, responsive and truly open environment.” DREAM

4. Infohabitants Individuals, organisations, as well as virtual entities acting on their behalf, smart appliances, etc. could be denoted as "infohabitants" of a Universal Information Ecosystem. Infohabitant: Chromosome? Individual? Agent? DREAM

5. DREAM Distributed Resource Evolutionary Algorithm Machine A virtual machine constructed using a number of simple machines connected over the internet, that allows infohabitants to evolve, communicate, negotiate and trade, in the pursuit of some individual goal, with the possible achievement of some global goal. DREAM

6. DREAM Objectives - 1 • To create the software infrastructure necessary to support evolving infohabitants in an open and scalable fashion, using existing Internet infrastructure and existing hardware resources • To unify evolution approaches, so that infohabitants can evolve using a number of complementary mechanisms • To allow meta-optimisation procedures, so that the algorithms for evolution themselves can be optimised by co-evolving a virtual world with the infohabitants it contains DREAM

7. DREAM Objectives - 2 • To create the software infrastructure necessary to support the emergent virtual economy that will result from the implementation of virtual machine onto physical resources • To demonstrate the usefulness of the infrastructure by using it to implement three applications which can make full use of it • Optimisation - Scheduling • Modelling - Data Mining • Simulation - economic and social systems DREAM

8. Innovation A framework in which to develop instantiations of applications, rather than having the models or problems hard-coded into it, which allows: • the solution of industrial optimisation problems and the simulation of the behaviour of large systems • free migration of infohabitants through the internet, thus allowing the formation of diverse niches • the use of spare CPU cycles in an automated and secure manner • behaviour at the macro level to be observed • scalability and openness DREAM

9. Virtual Level Any number of experiments may exist at the same time on one DREAM DREAM A Experiment 1 Experiment 3 Experiment 2 DREAM

10. Virtual Level • Problems can be tackled in an adaptive fashion • Individual infohabitants or sub-population can compete - giving quality pressures • Possibility for co-operation, negotiation or trade • This will lead to a collective intelligence that divides the problem at hand and allows infohabitants to generate a solution jointly • In addition, a virtual society can be set up to simulate aspects of real society DREAM

11. DREAM Evolution • The system will be designed to include at least all the existing systems for evolution (Genetic Algorithms, Evolution Strategies, Evolutionary Programming, Genetic Programming, etc.) and will unify these • Meta-evolution procedures will be allowed, so that algorithms for evolution can be optimised by co-evolving a virtual world with the inhabitants in contains DREAM

12. Standard Island Model EA • Individual : • genome • Each island implements a local EA : • Infohabitants selection, • Reproduction / mutation, • Evaluation, • Individuals are migrated periodically (distribution). DREAM

13. Extensions to Island Model • Simulator for human societies. • Emergence of economic and social aspects. • Evaluation of given policy and design of new policies (inverse pb). • The standard algorithm must be enriched. DREAM

14. Proposed algorithm • Local economy based on ACUs (Activation Currency Unit) • Individual : • Each island implements a specific local EA : • Several ACUs per infohabitant. • Selection of parents + Reproduction / variation, • N ACUs per newborn, • Activation of infohabitants (fixed tax), • Reward, • Selection (poor infohabitants die). +“Governmental” activities (island policy, migration management, environmental tasks (library), creation of new islands, …) • genome • “brain” • UID • purse • Other personal • methods DREAM

15. Possible activities for infohabitants • Reproduction (cloning). • Variation (mutation, recombination …). • ACUs management: • Borrowing (w or w/o interests) • Lending (w or w/o interests) • Trade (sell / buy) • Evaluation • Migration • Communication: • With the island (queries on island policy, on other islands,…) • (1-1 / 1-n), Whenever activated, the brain decides of the action to take. Each activity has a cost  possible emergence of an economy. Communication  possible emergence of social aspects. DREAM

16. Downgraded Algorithm • Mono-ACU local economy. • Individual : Each island implements a specific local EA : • 1 ACU per infohabitant. • Selection of parents + Reproduction / variation, • 1 ACU per newborn, • Activation of infohabitants = evaluation (fixed tax of 1 ACU), • Reward with at most 1 ACU (selection by the island), • Garbage collection (poor infohabitants die). + governmental migration … • genome • “brain ” • UID • purse • Other personal • methods DREAM

17. Physical Level DREAM A • A DREAM may use any number of physical machines • A physical machine could run more than one DREAM • The DREAM will not interfere with the other functions of the machine • It will use only the CPU time allocated to it - normally just spare CPU time • Physical machines could be co-located, or spread world-wide • Allows much more efficient use of resources DREAM B DREAM

18. Structure • Usually (if there are enough machines) there will be one island per machine. • An island cannot be split between machines • Islands can cause new islands to exist on some machine • Each machine will know about at least some other machines • The machines will form a connected graph (hopefully and usually) DREAM

19. Interacting with the DREAM • To start an experiment a user must connect their machine to the DREAM as a console. • To monitor or control an experiment the console machine (or some other acting as the console) must be connected. • If the console has been unconnected then there may be delay between connecting and the time when each of themachines knows the console is there. DREAM

20. Sharing of Resources • How resources should be shared is a difficult problem. • Should someone giving more resources be able to use more resources? • The DREAM will allow the collection of resource provision and use data, and the implementation of distribution policies. • The distribution policy itself will be left to the DREAM administrators to decide. DREAM

21. Implementation • Using Java • On Linux and Windows Operating Systems • Probably using an existing open source agent based system as the basis DREAM

22. DREAM-User Interface Good interfaces to such a complex system are vital. • Input interface: Will allow the definition of the characteristics of the target experiment, and the kind of infohabitants that will evolve in that world. Specifying experiments and infohabitants through graphical manipulation will be possible • Output interface: Will allow the graphical monitoring of observables at the infohabitant, island and experiment level DREAM

23. Conclusions • A general framework will be built that will allow the building of DREAMs and the specification of experiments to run on those DREAMs with the minimum of effort • The framework will unify the different approaches to evolutionary computing • There will be a much more efficient use of resources • New functionality will (we hope) lead to new emergent behaviour DREAM

24. The End • Slides after this point are not part of the presentation but just filed here in cases they are needed! DREAM

25. Proof of Principle The usefulness of the framework will be tested by building three proof-of-principle applications using it: • Optimisation: Distributed Human Resource Scheduling • Modelling: Distributed Data Mining • Simulation: E.g. Road Traffic Balancing, Tax/Welfare Policy - Both direct and inverse problem DREAM

26. Software Master Module Owns Exp 1 Each computer within a DREAM will have either the DREAM master software module or the smaller slave module which doesn’t allow user interaction. Each computer will also have a software module for each experiment it is participating in. Not all computers will participate in each experiment because, for example, an experiment module may not exist for each platform. Exp 2 Module Exp 1 Module Master Module Owns Exp 2 Exp 2 Module Exp 1 Module Slave Module Exp 1 Module DREAM

27. Project Timetable DREAM

28. Conclusion • Standard EA are still allowed (downgraded mode) • The DREAM seems to be able to implement all WorkPackages. DREAM

29. Commission Funding Structure • Information Society Technologies • Future and Emerging Technologies • Proactive Initiatives • Quantum information processing and communication • Nanotechnology information devices • Universal Information Ecosystems DREAM

30. UIE Features • Openness and Universality • Scalable • Timeliness and relevance • Adapting to changing conditions • Realising objectives and intentions DREAM

31. The Partners • Napier University - Ben Paechter • University of Dortmund - Thomas Baeck • Ecole Polytechnique - Marc Schoenauer • Leiden University - Gusz Eiben • University of Granada - JJ Merelo • South Bank University - Terry Fogarty Project is worth 1,106,000 euros over three years DREAM

32. DREAM Economy • Infohabitants will use hardware resources owned by someone other than the infohabitant’s owner • People giving large amount of computer resources will want to be able to draw on these “banked resources” at some later time. • An economy based on the raw material of computer resources will emerge • Infohabitants may use this currency is their interactions • Relationships between the economic wealth of an infohabitant and its fitness will be investigated DREAM