Skip to content

TAC skills ledger-based

The AEA TAC - trading agent competition - skills demonstrate an interaction between multiple AEAs in a game.

There are two types of AEAs:

  • The tac_controller which coordinates the game.
  • The tac_participant AEAs which compete in the game. The tac_participant AEAs trade tokens with each other to maximize their utility.

Discussion

This demo shows how agents negotiate autonomously with each other while they pursue their goals by participating in the Trading Agents Competition (TAC). The demo can be run against Fetchai or Ethereum ledger. Transactions are validated on an ERC1155 smart contract on the Fetchai StargateWorld or a local Ganache Ethereum testnet.

In the following video we discuss the framework and TAC in more detail:

Communication

There are two types of interactions: - between the controller and participants (game management communication) - between the participants (negotiations)

Registration communication

This diagram shows the communication between the various entities during the registration phase.

sequenceDiagram participant Agent_2 participant Agent_1 participant Search participant Controller activate Search activate Controller Controller->>Search: register_service activate Agent_1 Agent_1->>Search: search Search-->>Agent_1: controller Agent_1->>Controller: register activate Agent_2 Agent_2->>Search: search Search-->>Agent_2: controller Agent_2->>Controller: register Controller->>Agent_1: game_data Controller->>Agent_2: game_data deactivate Agent_1 deactivate Agent_2 deactivate Search deactivate Controller

Transaction communication

This diagram shows the communication between two AEAs and a controller. In this case, we have a Seller_Agent which is set up as a seller (and registers itself as such with the controller during the registration phase). We also have the Searching_Agent which is set up to search for sellers.

sequenceDiagram participant Buyer_Agent participant Seller_Agent participant Search participant Controller activate Buyer_Agent activate Seller_Agent activate Search activate Controller Seller_Agent->>Search: register_service Buyer_Agent->>Search: search Search-->>Buyer_Agent: list_of_agents Buyer_Agent->>Seller_Agent: call_for_proposal Seller_Agent->>Buyer_Agent: proposal Buyer_Agent->>Seller_Agent: accept Seller_Agent->>Buyer_Agent: match_accept Seller_Agent->>Controller: transaction Controller->>Controller: transaction_execution Controller->>Seller_Agent: confirm_transaction Controller->>Buyer_Agent: confirm_transaction deactivate Buyer_Agent deactivate Seller_Agent deactivate Search deactivate Controller

In the above case, the proposal received contains a set of goods to sell and an associated price. The buyer AEA needs to determine if this is a good deal for them, and if so, it accepts.

There is an equivalent diagram for seller AEAs set up to search for buyers and their interaction with AEAs which are registered as buyers. In that scenario, the proposal will instead be a list of goods that the buyer wishes to buy and the price it is willing to pay for them.

Preparation instructions

Dependencies

Follow the Preliminaries and Installation sections from the AEA quick start.

Demo instructions (Fetchai):

Follow this instruction to run TAC against the fetch.ai StargateWorld test-net.

Fetch TAC controller AEA

In the root directory, fetch the controller AEA: 

aea fetch fetchai/tac_controller_contract:0.31.0
cd tac_controller_contract
aea install
aea build

Alternatively, create from scratch.

The following steps create the controller from scratch: 

aea create tac_controller_contract
cd tac_controller_contract
aea add connection fetchai/p2p_libp2p:0.25.0
aea add connection fetchai/soef:0.26.0
aea add connection fetchai/ledger:0.19.0
aea add skill fetchai/tac_control_contract:0.26.0
aea config set --type dict agent.dependencies \
'{
  "aea-ledger-fetchai": {"version": "<2.0.0,>=1.0.0"},
  "aea-ledger-ethereum": {"version": "<2.0.0,>=1.0.0"}
}'
aea config set agent.default_connection fetchai/p2p_libp2p:0.25.0
aea config set agent.default_ledger fetchai
aea config set vendor.fetchai.connections.soef.config.chain_identifier fetchai_v2_misc
aea config set --type bool vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_control.is_abstract true
aea config set --type dict agent.default_routing \
'{
  "fetchai/contract_api:1.0.0": "fetchai/ledger:0.19.0",
  "fetchai/ledger_api:1.0.0": "fetchai/ledger:0.19.0",
  "fetchai/oef_search:1.0.0": "fetchai/soef:0.26.0"
}'
aea config set --type list vendor.fetchai.connections.p2p_libp2p.cert_requests \
'[{"identifier": "acn", "ledger_id": "fetchai", "not_after": "2022-01-01", "not_before": "2021-01-01", "public_key": "fetchai", "save_path": ".certs/conn_cert.txt"}]'
aea install
aea build

Fetch the TAC participant AEAs

In separate terminals, in the root directory, fetch at least two participants: 

aea fetch fetchai/tac_participant_contract:0.21.0 --alias tac_participant_one
cd tac_participant_one
aea install
aea build
cd ..
aea fetch fetchai/tac_participant_contract:0.21.0 --alias tac_participant_two
cd tac_participant_two
aea install
aea build

Alternatively, create from scratch.

In a separate terminal, in the root directory, create at least two tac participant AEAs: 

aea create tac_participant_one
aea create tac_participant_two
Build participant one: 
cd tac_participant_one
aea add connection fetchai/p2p_libp2p:0.25.0
aea add connection fetchai/soef:0.26.0
aea add connection fetchai/ledger:0.19.0
aea add skill fetchai/tac_participation:0.24.0
aea add skill fetchai/tac_negotiation:0.28.0
aea config set --type dict agent.dependencies \
'{
  "aea-ledger-fetchai": {"version": "<2.0.0,>=1.0.0"},
  "aea-ledger-ethereum": {"version": "<2.0.0,>=1.0.0"}
}'
aea config set agent.default_connection fetchai/p2p_libp2p:0.25.0
aea config set agent.default_ledger fetchai
aea config set vendor.fetchai.connections.soef.config.chain_identifier fetchai_v2_misc
aea config set vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_participation.models.game.args.is_using_contract 'True' --type bool
aea config set vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_negotiation.models.strategy.args.is_contract_tx 'True' --type bool
aea config set --type dict agent.default_routing \
'{
  "fetchai/contract_api:1.0.0": "fetchai/ledger:0.19.0",
  "fetchai/ledger_api:1.0.0": "fetchai/ledger:0.19.0",
  "fetchai/oef_search:1.0.0": "fetchai/soef:0.26.0"
}'
aea config set --type dict agent.decision_maker_handler \
'{
  "dotted_path": "aea.decision_maker.gop:DecisionMakerHandler",
  "file_path": null
}'
aea config set --type list vendor.fetchai.connections.p2p_libp2p.cert_requests \
'''[{"identifier": "acn", "ledger_id": "fetchai", "message_format": "'{public_key}'", "not_after": "2022-01-01", "not_before": "2021-01-01", "public_key": "fetchai", "save_path": ".certs/conn_cert.txt"}]'''
aea install
aea build
Then, build participant two: 
cd tac_participant_two
aea add connection fetchai/p2p_libp2p:0.25.0
aea add connection fetchai/soef:0.26.0
aea add connection fetchai/ledger:0.19.0
aea add skill fetchai/tac_participation:0.24.0
aea add skill fetchai/tac_negotiation:0.28.0
aea config set --type dict agent.dependencies \
'{
  "aea-ledger-fetchai": {"version": "<2.0.0,>=1.0.0"},
  "aea-ledger-ethereum": {"version": "<2.0.0,>=1.0.0"}
}'
aea config set agent.default_connection fetchai/p2p_libp2p:0.25.0
aea config set agent.default_ledger fetchai
aea config set vendor.fetchai.connections.soef.config.chain_identifier fetchai_v2_misc
aea config set vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_participation.models.game.args.is_using_contract 'True' --type bool
aea config set vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_negotiation.models.strategy.args.is_contract_tx 'True' --type bool
aea config set --type dict agent.default_routing \
'{
  "fetchai/contract_api:1.0.0": "fetchai/ledger:0.19.0",
  "fetchai/ledger_api:1.0.0": "fetchai/ledger:0.19.0",
  "fetchai/oef_search:1.0.0": "fetchai/soef:0.26.0"
}'
aea config set --type dict agent.decision_maker_handler \
'{
  "dotted_path": "aea.decision_maker.gop:DecisionMakerHandler",
  "file_path": null
}'
aea config set --type list vendor.fetchai.connections.p2p_libp2p.cert_requests \
'''[{"identifier": "acn", "ledger_id": "fetchai", "message_format": "'{public_key}'", "not_after": "2022-01-01", "not_before": "2021-01-01", "public_key": "fetchai", "save_path": ".certs/conn_cert.txt"}]'''
aea install
aea build

Add keys for all AEAs

For every AEA in the competition (controller and participants):

First generate and add a private key: 

aea generate-key fetchai
aea add-key fetchai fetchai_private_key.txt

Then create and add a separate private key for secure communication: 

aea generate-key fetchai fetchai_connection_private_key.txt
aea add-key fetchai fetchai_connection_private_key.txt --connection

Finally, certify the key for use by the connections that request that: 

aea issue-certificates

Update the game parameters in the controller

In the tac controller project, get and set the registration start time (set it to at least 5 minutes in the future):

aea config get vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_control_contract.models.parameters.args.registration_start_time
aea config set vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_control_contract.models.parameters.args.registration_start_time '01 01 2020  00:01'

To set the registration time, you may find handy the following command: 

aea config set vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_control_contract.models.parameters.args.registration_start_time "$(date -d "5 minutes" +'%d %m %Y %H:%M')"

Update the connection parameters

Update the connection parameters of the TAC participants to allow them to connect to the same local agent communication network as the TAC controller.

First, retrieve controller's local ACN address by running the following in the controller agent's project terminal:

aea get-multiaddress fetchai -c -i fetchai/p2p_libp2p:0.25.0 -u public_uri

Then, in participant one, run this command (replace SOME_ADDRESS with the value you retrieved above): 

aea config set --type dict vendor.fetchai.connections.p2p_libp2p.config \
'{
  "delegate_uri": "127.0.0.1:11001",
  "entry_peers": ["SOME_ADDRESS"],
  "local_uri": "127.0.0.1:9001",
  "log_file": "libp2p_node.log",
  "public_uri": "127.0.0.1:9001"
}'

Do the same in participant two (beware of the different port numbers): 

aea config set --type dict vendor.fetchai.connections.p2p_libp2p.config \
'{
  "delegate_uri": "127.0.0.1:11002",
  "entry_peers": ["SOME_ADDRESS"],
  "local_uri": "127.0.0.1:9002",
  "log_file": "libp2p_node.log",
  "public_uri": "127.0.0.1:9002"
}'

Fund agents' accounts

Retrieve the address of each agent (in each terminal):

aea get-address fetchai

Go to the StargateWorld block explorer and request some test tokens via Get Funds.

To check the wealth of an AEA, use:

aea get-wealth fetchai

Run the AEAs

First, launch the tac_contract_controller then the participants by executing the following from their respective terminals: 

aea run

The CLI tool supports launching several agents at once. For example, assuming you followed the tutorial, you can launch both TAC participant agents as follows from the root directory (ensure you run the controller agent first as above): 

aea launch tac_participant_one tac_participant_two

You may want to try --multithreaded option in order to run the agents in the same process.

Cleaning up

When you're finished, delete your AEAs: 

aea delete tac_controller_contract
aea delete tac_participant_one
aea delete tac_participant_two

Demo instructions (Ethereum):

Follow this instruction to run TAC against a local Ganache Ethereum test-net.

Create TAC controller AEA

In the root directory, fetch the controller AEA: 

aea fetch fetchai/tac_controller_contract:0.31.0
cd tac_controller_contract
aea install
aea build

Alternatively, create from scratch.

The following steps create the controller from scratch: 

aea create tac_controller_contract
cd tac_controller_contract
aea add connection fetchai/p2p_libp2p:0.25.0
aea add connection fetchai/soef:0.26.0
aea add connection fetchai/ledger:0.19.0
aea add skill fetchai/tac_control_contract:0.26.0
aea config set --type dict agent.dependencies \
'{
  "aea-ledger-fetchai": {"version": "<2.0.0,>=1.0.0"},
  "aea-ledger-ethereum": {"version": "<2.0.0,>=1.0.0"}
}'
aea config set agent.default_connection fetchai/p2p_libp2p:0.25.0
aea config set agent.default_ledger ethereum
aea config set vendor.fetchai.connections.soef.config.chain_identifier ethereum
aea config set --type bool vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_control.is_abstract true
aea config set --type dict agent.default_routing \
'{
  "fetchai/contract_api:1.0.0": "fetchai/ledger:0.19.0",
  "fetchai/ledger_api:1.0.0": "fetchai/ledger:0.19.0",
  "fetchai/oef_search:1.0.0": "fetchai/soef:0.26.0"
}'
aea config set --type list vendor.fetchai.connections.p2p_libp2p.cert_requests \
'[{"identifier": "acn", "ledger_id": "ethereum", "not_after": "2022-01-01", "not_before": "2021-01-01", "public_key": "fetchai", "save_path": ".certs/conn_cert.txt"}]'
aea install
aea build

Fetch the TAC participant AEAs

In separate terminals, in the root directory, fetch at least two participants: 

aea fetch fetchai/tac_participant_contract:0.21.0 --alias tac_participant_one
cd tac_participant_one
aea install
aea build
cd ..
aea fetch fetchai/tac_participant_contract:0.21.0 --alias tac_participant_two
cd tac_participant_two
aea install
aea build

Alternatively, create from scratch.

In a separate terminal, in the root directory, create at least two tac participant AEAs: 

aea create tac_participant_one
aea create tac_participant_two
Build participant one: 
cd tac_participant_one
aea add connection fetchai/p2p_libp2p:0.25.0
aea add connection fetchai/soef:0.26.0
aea add connection fetchai/ledger:0.19.0
aea add skill fetchai/tac_participation:0.24.0
aea add skill fetchai/tac_negotiation:0.28.0
aea config set --type dict agent.dependencies \
'{
  "aea-ledger-fetchai": {"version": "<2.0.0,>=1.0.0"},
  "aea-ledger-ethereum": {"version": "<2.0.0,>=1.0.0"}
}'
aea config set agent.default_connection fetchai/p2p_libp2p:0.25.0
aea config set agent.default_ledger ethereum
aea config set vendor.fetchai.connections.soef.config.chain_identifier ethereum
aea config set vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_participation.models.game.args.is_using_contract 'True' --type bool
aea config set vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_negotiation.models.strategy.args.is_contract_tx 'True' --type bool
aea config set --type dict agent.default_routing \
'{
  "fetchai/contract_api:1.0.0": "fetchai/ledger:0.19.0",
  "fetchai/ledger_api:1.0.0": "fetchai/ledger:0.19.0",
  "fetchai/oef_search:1.0.0": "fetchai/soef:0.26.0"
}'
aea config set --type dict agent.decision_maker_handler \
'{
  "dotted_path": "aea.decision_maker.gop:DecisionMakerHandler",
  "file_path": null
}'
aea config set --type list vendor.fetchai.connections.p2p_libp2p.cert_requests \
'''[{"identifier": "acn", "ledger_id": "ethereum", "message_format": "'{public_key}'", "not_after": "2022-01-01", "not_before": "2021-01-01", "public_key": "fetchai", "save_path": ".certs/conn_cert.txt"}]'''
aea install
aea build
Then, build participant two: 
cd tac_participant_two
aea add connection fetchai/p2p_libp2p:0.25.0
aea add connection fetchai/soef:0.26.0
aea add connection fetchai/ledger:0.19.0
aea add skill fetchai/tac_participation:0.24.0
aea add skill fetchai/tac_negotiation:0.28.0
aea config set --type dict agent.dependencies \
'{
  "aea-ledger-fetchai": {"version": "<2.0.0,>=1.0.0"},
  "aea-ledger-ethereum": {"version": "<2.0.0,>=1.0.0"}
}'
aea config set agent.default_connection fetchai/p2p_libp2p:0.25.0
aea config set agent.default_ledger ethereum
aea config set vendor.fetchai.connections.soef.config.chain_identifier ethereum
aea config set vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_participation.models.game.args.is_using_contract 'True' --type bool
aea config set vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_negotiation.models.strategy.args.is_contract_tx 'True' --type bool
aea config set --type dict agent.default_routing \
'{
  "fetchai/contract_api:1.0.0": "fetchai/ledger:0.19.0",
  "fetchai/ledger_api:1.0.0": "fetchai/ledger:0.19.0",
  "fetchai/oef_search:1.0.0": "fetchai/soef:0.26.0"
}'
aea config set --type dict agent.decision_maker_handler \
'{
  "dotted_path": "aea.decision_maker.gop:DecisionMakerHandler",
  "file_path": null
}'
aea config set --type list vendor.fetchai.connections.p2p_libp2p.cert_requests \
'''[{"identifier": "acn", "ledger_id": "ethereum", "message_format": "'{public_key}'", "not_after": "2022-01-01", "not_before": "2021-01-01", "public_key": "fetchai", "save_path": ".certs/conn_cert.txt"}]'''
aea install
aea build

Configure the agents to use Ethereum

Run the following in every AEA's terminal:

aea config set agent.default_ledger ethereum
json=$(printf '[{"identifier": "acn", "ledger_id": "ethereum", "not_after": "2022-01-01", "not_before": "2021-01-01", "public_key": "fetchai", "message_format": "{public_key}", "save_path": ".certs/conn_cert.txt"}]')
aea config set --type list vendor.fetchai.connections.p2p_libp2p.cert_requests "$json"
aea config set vendor.fetchai.connections.soef.config.chain_identifier ethereum

Add keys for all AEAs

For every AEA in the competition (controller and participants):

First generate and add a private key: 

aea generate-key ethereum
aea add-key ethereum ethereum_private_key.txt

Then create and add a separate private key for secure communication: 

aea generate-key fetchai fetchai_connection_private_key.txt
aea add-key fetchai fetchai_connection_private_key.txt --connection

Finally, certify the key for use by the connections that request that: 

aea issue-certificates

Update the game parameters in the controller

In the tac controller project, get and set the registration start time (set it to at least 5 minutes in the future):

aea config get vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_control_contract.models.parameters.args.registration_start_time
aea config set vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_control_contract.models.parameters.args.registration_start_time '01 01 2020  00:01'

To set the registration time, you may find handy the following command: 

aea config set vendor.fetchai.skills.tac_control_contract.models.parameters.args.registration_start_time "$(date -d "5 minutes" +'%d %m %Y %H:%M')"

Update the connection parameters

Update the connection parameters of the TAC participants to allow them to connect to the same local agent communication network as the TAC controller.

First, retrieve controller's local ACN address by running the following in the controller agent's project terminal:

aea get-multiaddress fetchai -c -i fetchai/p2p_libp2p:0.25.0 -u public_uri

Then, in participant one, run this command (replace SOME_ADDRESS with the value you retrieved above): 

aea config set --type dict vendor.fetchai.connections.p2p_libp2p.config \
'{
  "delegate_uri": "127.0.0.1:11001",
  "entry_peers": ["SOME_ADDRESS"],
  "local_uri": "127.0.0.1:9001",
  "log_file": "libp2p_node.log",
  "public_uri": "127.0.0.1:9001"
}'

Do the same in participant two (beware of the different port numbers): 

aea config set --type dict vendor.fetchai.connections.p2p_libp2p.config \
'{
  "delegate_uri": "127.0.0.1:11002",
  "entry_peers": ["SOME_ADDRESS"],
  "local_uri": "127.0.0.1:9002",
  "log_file": "libp2p_node.log",
  "public_uri": "127.0.0.1:9002"
}'

Fund agents' accounts

Run a local Ganache Ethereum test-net with funds for the addresses of the three AEAs in this demo: 

docker run -p 8545:8545 trufflesuite/ganache-cli:latest --verbose --gasPrice=0 --gasLimit=0x1fffffffffffff --account="$(cat tac_controller_contract/ethereum_private_key.txt),1000000000000000000000" --account="$(cat tac_participant_one/ethereum_private_key.txt),1000000000000000000000" --account="$(cat tac_participant_two/ethereum_private_key.txt),1000000000000000000000"

To check the wealth of an AEA, use:

aea get-wealth ethereum

You should get 1000000000000000000000.

Run the AEAs

First, launch the tac_contract_controller then the participants by executing the following from their respective terminals: 

aea run

The CLI tool supports launching several agents at once. For example, assuming you followed the tutorial, you can launch both TAC participant agents as follows from the root directory (ensure you run the controller agent first as above): 

aea launch tac_participant_one tac_participant_two

You may want to try --multithreaded option in order to run the agents in the same process.

Cleaning up

When you're finished, delete your AEAs: 

aea delete tac_controller_contract
aea delete tac_participant_one
aea delete tac_participant_two