INTELLIGENT AGENTS

An intelligent agent (or bot) is software that assists you, or acts on your behalf, in performing repetitive computer-related tasks. The tasks usually involve finding and collecting information, rather like a very intelligent, well-trained, tracking "software dog" in your computer. There are four types of intelligent agents.

• Buyer agents or shopping bots
• User or personal agents
• Monitoring-and-surveillance or predictive agents
• Data-mining agents

Below are some examples of these types of agents. You can find many more by visiting sites such as Agentland. On the Web you can also find information on other types of agents such as Chatterbots (that hold conversations with you) and filtering agents that filter out cookies, Spam, and other unwanted intruders.

Buyer Agents or Shopping Bots

Aristocart is an intelligent agent that allows you to find products. It will automatically intercept an item you select and add it to your shopping cart. Even better, it will do some comparison shopping on the items you selected to find the best price for you.

User or personal agents

WebHunt lets you simultaneously browse and search several sites. The software provides you with tabs that let you move easily between sites and with one mouse click you can open a whole group of sites. You can also set the software to close popup windows and you can control the downloading of images, sounds, videos, JavaScript and ActiveX, turning it on or off. It also supports multiple search engines.

Copernic is sort of like your own personal Cliff Notes developer. It generates summaries of text and identifies key concepts, saving you time and reading.

Monitoring-and-Surveillance Agents

Monitoring-and-surveillance agents can do more than watch networks and equipment for activity. They can also be used to monitor people using computers and networks – even across the Internet. e-Surveiller is an example. It can capture the screen of some using a computer and get it to you in real time.

Data-Mining Agents

Eve is a data-mining agent of a different sort. Instead of searching through a company's data warehouse it sees the Internet as a giant data warehouse of articles and essays. Its function is to allow instructors, teachers, and professors to search for material on the Web that a student may have plagiarized. It works for all levels of the education system.