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AIList Digest Volume 6 Issue 025
AIList Digest Friday, 5 Feb 1988 Volume 6 : Issue 25
Today's Topics:
Administrivia - Head Count,
Queries - Imbeddable Inference System & Common Lisp OPS5 &
Genetic Algorithms & AI Surveys,
Expert Systems - Software Engineering and Expert Systems,
AI Tools - Engineering Data Modeling & XLISP,
Vision - Ten Best Vision References,
Linguistics - Natural vs. Artificial Languages & Ambiguous Speech
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Date: Thu 4 Feb 88 21:37:20-PST
From: Ken Laws <LAWS@KL.SRI.COM>
Reply-to: AIList-Request@SRI.COM
Subject: Head Count
I would like to get an estimate of the AIList readership.
If your birthday is in the range February 1 to February 15,
please send an empty reply to this message or digest. I
will multiply by the appropriate factor to estimate the number
of list members.
-- Ken
------------------------------
Date: Mon 1 Feb 88 01:23:04-PST
From: Joe Karnicky <KARNICKY@KL.SRI.COM>
Subject: seeking imbeddable inference system
A friend of mine creates programs and devices to enable severely
handicapped individuals to interact with computers (IBM PC
compatibles because of financial considerations). He and I have
spent time discussing possible ways that knowledge based programming
(my own area of practice) can be usefully incorporated into
these programs.
For example, he has a program that repeatedly
scans an array of icons. At a signal from the user, an icon is
selected and a corresponding message is output - possibly through
a speech synthesizer. One possibility is to have the icon selection
generate a fact or goal into an inference system. The final output
from this system would then be "customized", i.e. modified by the
context of the interaction. (for example, the time of day, the
mood or condition of the user, the current activity etc.)
Now, to implement this economically what we would like to
have is a simple, cheap ($100), IMBEDDABLE inference system. Something on the
level of turboprolog would be adequate, except I'm told that it pretty
much insists on being boss.
Any suggestions would be appreciated.
Thanks,
Joe Karnicky <KARNICKY@STRIPE.SRI.COM>
------------------------------
Date: 3 Feb 88 20:48:00 CST
From: "PERRY ALEXANDER" <alexander@space-tech.arpa>
Reply-to: "PERRY ALEXANDER" <alexander@space-tech.arpa>
Subject: Common Lisp OPS5
Hello,
Does anybody out there know of a common lisp version of OPS5 I can get ahold
of? I have a franz version, but have not seemed to be able to locate a
common lisp version. Please respond directly to me, I will summarize.
Thanks,
Perry Alexander
alexander@space-tech.arpa
University of Kansas
Telecommunications and Information Sciences Lab (TISL)
------------------------------
Date: 2 Feb 88 22:02:00 GMT
From: goldfain@osiris.cso.uiuc.edu
Subject: Re: Cognitive System using Genetic Algo
Would someone do me a favor and post or email a short definition of the
term "Genetic Learning Algorithm" or "Genetic Algorithm" ?
Thanks. - Mark Goldfain arpa: goldfain@osiris.cso.uiuc.edu
------------------------------
Date: 2 Feb 88 21:38:42 GMT
From: mtune!codas!killer!wybbs!meyers@rutgers.edu (John Meyers)
Subject: Sources for research?
I have to do some research on Artificial Intelligence (primarily the
history , but also current applications) and I would like to know if
anyone could recommend a good (and recent) book dealing with the two areas
of AI I have mentioned. Thank you.
John Meyers
--
__ , |John Michael Meyers -> meyers@wybbs.UUCP
(_/_ / /)) _ _ _ _ |
_/(//)/) / / (-'(/(-'/ ' '-,|DISHCLAIMER:Well, the one with the pizza
(/""""""""""""""(_/"""""""""" | is mine, but...
------------------------------
Date: 3 Feb 88 02:21:03 GMT
From: kohen@rocky.STANFORD.EDU (Abe Kohen)
Reply-to: kohen@rocky.UUCP (Abe Kohen)
Subject: Re: Software Development and Expert Systems
The query and responses seem to be geared to custom-built systems.
I'd like to ask about s/w development for expert systems using
commercially available tools.
How do tools like S.1, Art, or Nexpert lend themselves to good s/w
engineering. Are some tools better for s/w engineering? Are they
better (whatever that means) at the expense of clear and efficient
data representation.
It seems that S.1 has the potential for providing a good s/w engineering
environment, but it fails on data representation, and is lacking forward
chaining (vaporware not withstanding). Art has good data representation,
but doesn't (yet) integrate well into a workstation (read: Sun) environment.
How does Nexpert perform?
kohen@rocky.stanford.edu
kohen@sushi.stanford.edu
------------------------------
Date: Wed, 3 Feb 88 11:14:51 est
From: france@vtopus.cs.vt.edu (Robert France)
Subject: Re: Software engineering and expert systems.
Regarding the discussion by (among others) Ron Jacobs and Will Neuhauser,
we have also tried applying the basic software engineering principles
of modularity and information hiding to expert systems construction, and
can report good success. For about the last four years, a group of
graduate students under the direction of Ed Fox has been working here
at Virginia Tech to build a large expert system to test the applicability
of knowledge-based techniques to information retrieval tasks. Faced
with the size and volatility of the intended system, as well as the
amount of knowledge it is intended to use and the size of the research
community involved in its construction and use, we opted for a highly
modular design.
Basically, the system is broken down into domain experts, each with its
own rule base and inference style. This sounds pretty close to the
approaches of Messrs. Jacobs and Neuhauser, and is really the obvious
countermeasure to the problems of unwanted inference and rule inter-
action. The intention is to have a set of generic inference engines;
at the moment I think they are all either forward- or backward-chaining
rule followers. These experts all communicate through a blackboard
that serves both as a communication interlink and a summary of the
system state at any point in the task. State information on the
blackboard then provides the data for task planning by a separate
module called the *strategist*, that tells the experts (in general
terms) what to do. The system also has large fact bases shared among
the experts and a separate user interface module. Details of the design
can be found in:
Fox, Edward A. and Robert K. France. "Architecture of an expert
system for composite document analysis, representation, and
retrieval." *International Journal of Approximate Reasoning*
v. 1 (1987), pp. 151-175.
We are currently working up a paper on the details of the blackboard/
strategist complex and the implementation of the initial version of
the system: anyone who wants a preprint can send me a line, and I'll
send out copies when they're available.
The good news is that we have a minimal functional system at this point
(Just. We're still congratulating ourselves before we start running
experiments comparing it to classical information retrieval methods.)
and that the modularity contributed highly to both ease of construction
and ease of modification. We were even able to take experts imple-
mented as stand-alone modules and integrate them into the system
with a minimum of fuss and bother. Further, while the modularity
means that the system has a *lot* of potential communication
overhead, the cost is less than we feared (it is, for instance,
overwhelmed by the cost of inferential processing) and bearable
(most system operations take less than a second running on a lightly
loaded VAX 11/785, even if they involve moderation by the blackboard
and scheduling activity by the strategist as well as activity by
the called expert). And this in the relatively unsophisticated
implementation of `Version 1.0'.
To sum up, our experience with expert system modularity is that
it is practical, functional, and that it greatly eases system
constuction and modification. But then, isn't that what the
software engineers told us to expect?
Cheers,
Robert France
france@vtopus
Department of Computer Science
Virginia Tech
Blacksburg, VA 24014
"It doesn't stop; it doesn't even slow down."
------------------------------
Date: 1 Feb 88 9:32 +0100
From: Kai Quale <quale%si.uninett@TOR.nta.no>
Subject: Engineering Data Modelling Info
>I am working in the area of Engineering Databases, here at Georgia
>Tech, and looking for information on Enginnering Data Modeling.
>Can anybody provide me with a list of good references in this area.
>Information on software packages for data modeling and names and
>address of people actively involved in this area will be also very
>helpful. The stress is on Engineering Data. I would really
>appreciate any help.
Sysdeco A/S (The SYStems DEvelopment COmpany) has a 4th gen. tool
for administrative database systems called Systemator, which provides
data modeling (with automatic database design), screen picture design,
program generation and many other facilities. The data model is used
as an active data dictionary. As of today, Systemator runs on Norsk
Data hardware and the Sibas database system. However, it is being con-
verted to other machines and database systems. I don't know if Engin-
eering Data requires special facilities or if this is in the area of
what you want, but the address is :
Sysdeco A/S, Chr. Michelsens gt. 65, 0474 Oslo 4, Norway.
Telephone : 02 (Oslo) 38 30 90
Kai Quale <quale%si.uninett@TOR.NTA.NO>
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 1 Feb 88 10:44:59 PST
From: kevinr@june.cs.washington.edu (Kevin Ross)
Subject: Re: Query - XLISP 1.5
You can find a copy of xlisp 1.6 on uunet.uu.net in I belive volume 6.
I FTP'd it a few weeks ago.
Kevin
------------------------------
Date: Tue 2 Feb 88 07:09:08-EST
From: CAROZZONI@RADC-TOPS20.ARPA
Subject: Re: Query - XLISP 1.5
You can get XLISP 1.7 and 2.0 on BIX. Much imporved.
-joe
------------------------------
Date: Thu 28 Jan 88 22:21:05-PST
From: Ken Laws <LAWS@KL.SRI.COM>
Reply-to: AIList-Request@SRI.COM
Subject: Re: Ten best vision references..
Fischler and Firschein's recently published collection of vision
reprints (Readings in Computer Vision: Issues, Problems, Principles,
and Paradigms, Morgan Kaufmann Pub. Inc., 1987) includes many of
the important papers, but doesn't cover the whole field. I think
L.G. Roberts' paper on recognizing simple solids may be the only
paper everyone can agree on.
-- Ken
------------------------------
Date: Sat, 30 Jan 88 23:54:52-1000
From: todd@uhccux.uhcc.hawaii.edu (The Perplexed Wiz)
Subject: Re: 10 best vision references
>Date: 28 Jan 88 00:15:09 GMT
>From: hunt@spar.SPAR.SLB.COM (Neil Hunt)
>Subject: Ten best vision references..
>
>I would like to collect votes for the ten most important references
>in the field of computer vision. I will compile a list and repost
>if there is sufficient response. Feel free to vote for one paper,
>or as many as you like; each mention by a separate person
>counts as one vote.
>
> ...{amdahl|decwrl|hplabs}!spar!hunt hunt@spar.slb.com
This does not exactly answer Neil's question. However, those of you
interested in the general area of perception may want to take a look at the
following article.
White, Murray J. (1987). Big bangs in perception: The most
often cited authors and publications. Bulletin of the
Psychonomic Society, 25: 458-461.
His abstract is as follows:
Textbook citations identified historically important writers and
publications in the psychology of perception. The influence of
these writers and publications on present research was gauged from
citations appearing in the current journal literature.
--
Todd Ogasawara, U. of Hawaii Faculty Development Program
UUCP: {ihnp4,uunet,ucbvax,dcdwest}!sdcsvax!nosc!uhccux!todd
ARPA: uhccux!todd@nosc.MIL BITNET: todd@uhccux
INTERNET: todd@uhccux.UHCC.HAWAII.EDU
------------------------------
Date: Mon, 1 Feb 88 10:29:27 EST
From: rapaport@cs.Buffalo.EDU (William J. Rapaport)
Subject: natural vs. artificial languages
Two classic references are:
Richard Montague, "English as a Formal Language" and "Universal
Grammar," in R. Montague, _Formal Philosophy_, ed. by R. H. Thomason
(Yale U.P.).
------------------------------
Date: Thu, 4 Feb 88 22:40:36 EST
From: "Keith F. Lynch" <KFL@AI.AI.MIT.EDU>
Subject: Ambiguous speech
> From: ulysses!sfmag!sfsup!saal@ucbvax.Berkeley.EDU (S.Saal)
> "It's hard to wreck a nice beach." vs
> "Its hard to recognize speech."
> What I am looking for is more examples of these sentence pairs.
Eugene N. Miya (eugene@pioneer.arpa) has a list of these.
...Keith
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End of AIList Digest
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