Introducing AgentBase, for Agent Based Modeling from the Browser

wybo · on Dec 5, 2014

A side-project that came out of my (ongoing) thesis work at Oxford. I model social movements, and how the Internet and Social Media might affect them.

You can try a template model here: http://agentbase.org/model.html?9d54597f7aafc995d227

AgentBase uses:

* HTML canvas, jQuery, etc

* CoffeeScript browser library, for compilation of CoffeeScript

* ACE editor for code editing

* GitHub gists, mini-repositories for storage of models

* NodeJS + Mongo for keeping a list of models

Comments most welcome!

lucio · on Dec 5, 2014

This is really good. It is not receiving the deserved attention/upvotes on HN...

<sarcasm?> Make a game of it, maybe with flock, and you'll be on the front page for days... ;) </sarcasm?>

papad · on Dec 5, 2014

Yea this is great. As an applied math major in college, modeling was my favorite class with so many variations of ABMs with Monte Carlo randomness. Like you, I was focused on social sciences, specifically economics so love these methods to better simulate and understand our world.

My friends and I have taken similar shots at putting this functionality online, and turning it into a game is a great idea! Especially a game that helps teach/learn different concepts. For example, we had a previous project that allowed folks to learn Javascript by programming the AI for your different units in a RTS game. Unfortunately, we didn't have enough money/time to support it - hopefully we can bring it back online soon - but you can see more info on this reddit thread: http://www.reddit.com/r/learnprogramming/comments/1alfd9/jav...

Similar to you, we were using HTML5 canvas with a CodeMirror editor so users could modify and republish their own version in real-tim. I think you could do something similar where users had to modify the code (to different extents which could be levels) to get it to flock in certain ways. And then actually give the flock some real world story/context. That would be really cool.

lucio · on Dec 5, 2014

Great! Excellent work. I'm mesmerized with the flock example...

To try: # A more inestable flock http://agentbase.org/model.html?82ef4f46d2a05838dc5f

    @population = 55      # agents
    @setVision 4           # patches & set patch rect
    @minSeparation = 3 # patches

wybo · on Dec 5, 2014

Cool to see the tinkering works for you! It is mesmerizing :)

Do save your model as a new one if you want, makes it a one-click experience for visitors.

(in an ideal scenario AgentBase would do this automatically, and for each edit provide a link to that version... gists don't fork, sadly)

lucio · on Dec 5, 2014

Anyone not understanding what the three lines are, and how to apply them, has not the knowledge required to fully appreciate what you've done: Beauty from simplicity.

    @population = 55   # agents
    @setVision 4       # patches & set patch rect
    @minSeparation = 3 # patches

lucio · on Dec 5, 2014

this is not working for me... (Chrome v39.0) http://agentbase.org/model.html?d10d06e31f41874b982c

lucio · on Dec 5, 2014

What is exactly the difference with agentscript.org ?

wybo · on Dec 5, 2014

AgentBase.org as a website allows the in-browser editing and sharing of ABMs. These ABMs make use of the AgentBase library. This library is quite similar to AgentScript.

The AgentBase library actually was a fork from the AgentScript library. See here for why I forked it (basically to keep it simple and to be able to apply basic minimum coding standards and add automated tests): https://groups.google.com/forum/#!topic/agentbase/4NicEY8B6W...

Happy tinkering!