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Abstract
Agent-based Modeling and Simulation has become a mainstream tool for use inbusiness and research in multiple disciplines. Along with its mainstreamstatus, ABMS has attracted the attention of practitioners who are notcomfortable developing software in Java, C++ or any of the scripting languagescommonly used for ABMS frameworks. In particular, animal behavior researchers,or ethologists, require agent controllers that can describe complex animalbehavior in dynamic, unpredictable environments. But the existing solutions forexpressing agent controllers require complicated code. We present Pickle, anABMS platform that automatically generates complete simulations and agentsusing behavior-based controllers from simple XML file descriptions. This novelapproach allows for new approaches to understanding and reproducing collectiveanimal behavior, by controlling and evolving the fundamental behavioralmechanisms of its agents, rather than only the physical parameters of theirsensors and actuators.