Second, within each of these modular specifications, services are layered. We describe those services in the next section. The services of mobile agents are layered to support inter-operability between various types of static agents. First, in order to support integration of legacy applications into an agent network, the mobile agents provide a content service. The content service separates the specific content in the mobile agent from other networking and communication information that may accompany it.
Applications attached to static agents usually deal only with the content.
Second, it order to support peer to peer, asynchronous communication between static agents, mobile agents provide communication services. Finally, mobile agents also contain instructions and administrative information through the message service. These identification features support true asynchronous, peer to peer communication between static agents. The static agent will use this information to perform the correct meta level action. Basic services are supported by all static agents.