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AIList Digest Volume 8 Issue 044
AIList Digest Friday, 12 Aug 1988 Volume 8 : Issue 44
Today's Topics:
Spang Robinson Reports
Will computers dominate chess? (EURISKO)
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Date: Wed, 3 Aug 88 21:23:47 CDT
From: smu!leff@uunet.UU.NET (Laurence Leff)
Subject: bm940
Summary of Spang Robinson Report on Artificial Intelligence
Volume 4, No. 6, June 1988
The lead article is on research directions.
Randy Davis at MIT is developing deep-knowledge based systems for
dealing with relationships between devices. The work focusses on
digital circuits to do circuit design, test generation and
diagnosis. AI Squared is a new company using this technology
for medical instrumentations. They are delivering a system for
CAT Scanners called FELIX.
The article discusses Xerox Parc, how they bring such disciplines
as anthropology and psychology into AI efforts and study how people
"actually do design work." Xerox Parc is also looking at office system
to keep track of office documents.
Price
Waterhouse is doing research into auditing, tax planning
and consulting with a Big Eight accounting systems.
Richard Fikes, now at Price Waterhouse, is working on aprojectin international
corporate tax planning. They are also working on integrating textual
material that does notfit into a structureddomain model, but which
is applicable, using a hypertext-like technique.
Lockheed is adding spatial and temporal systems to their expert system
tool, LES. They are also working on result explanation by means other
than backtracking through rules and rule-base validation.
________________________________________
Neural Networks:
Robert Hecht-Neilsen, et. al. will have a proof that a three layer
Back Error Propagation neural network will always converge,under
certain conditions. Conditions are the use of 32 bit floating
point math, a square integrable mapping function and the mapping
regions must be compact and bounded.
Stephen Gallant has constructed a mechanism for neural-network
explanation. It uses an input vector with only three
values (false, unknown and true) and is faster than Back error Propagation.
The system has been patented.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
DARPA has appropriated 60 million for AI research, which is 80 percent
of total AI research. Jack Schwartz, the new DARPA Information
Science and Technology Office director, is favoring AI research
which lasts two to three years and has clearly definable results. Areas like
logic and those needing "intensive computation" are "considered overly
ambitious."
Cuts of between ten and thirty three percent are expected for AI research.
There will be emphasis on robotics and algorithms including AI.
________________________________________
Shorts:
Gold Hill Computers let go 20 out of 105 employees, most in sales.
1988 sales flat after a tripling in 1987. No cuts in development
staff.
Financia is a new company in England that will develop packaged
PC Expert systems to advise in Equities and Futures markets.
Intellicorp has been selected to be an Autorized Marketing Aid
for IBM RT's.
Geosource and Knowledge Systems are joining forces to develop and market
geophysical and geological applications for the energy industry.
Coopers and Lybrand has created Insurance ExperTAX that helps Insurance
companies identifying tax accrual issues and tax planning opportunities.
Neuron Data announced that its product now runs on HP 9000 series 300
and series 800 technical work stations.
Inference has made its ART available for the TI MicroExplorer and Sun 4.
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Date: Mon, 8 Aug 88 11:12:13 CDT
From: smu!leff@uunet.UU.NET (Laurence Leff)
Subject: bm954
Summary of
Spang Robinson Report on Artificial Intelligence, July 1988, Volume 4, No 7
Lead Article is on Knowledge-Based System Methodology and teaching of
same.
It describes training efforts at various firms such as IBM, TI, DEC
and accounting firms. Some of these training programs provide "automated
methodologies" and Arthur D. Little provides automated assistants
for these items. Some include sample systems, e. g. Cullinet's database
performance analyzer.
((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((
Learning Systems
System Technique Price
VP-Expert Kavanaugh Maps $124.95
Mac Smarts Kavanaugh Maps $250.00
Super Expert ID3 $195.00
Rule Master ID3 $495.00 generates C code
KnowledgeMaker ID3 $ 95.00 generates Prolog roles, M. 1, Insight 2
1st Class ID3 $495.00 tree can be edited
Fusion ID3 $1295.00 produces C or pascal code
IXL ID3 $495.00 uses statistical methods to predict
relationships, produces confiedence
factors
Beagle genetic $200.00 produces Fortran, Cor pPascal
learning
DuPont has used 1st Class and VP-Expert. An example-based protottype
for a Mylar manufactuirng machine was up in an afternoon after
conventional rule-based aporaches failed. An insurance company
achieved expert level performance in two weeks, 400 examples
and is now in "beta"
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AI Software/International Marketing.
Crystal is a system that supports an inductive approach and costs about
a thousand dollars.
Systems Designer Internation sells a SD-Prolog for $499.
Gold Hill percentage of sales in:
Japan 12 percent
Europe 10 percent
*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(*(
Shorts:
Hect-Nielsen (neural networks) received 3 million dollars in second
financing round.
Gensym and GigaMos settled their lawsuit confidentially.
Survey of large financial servies show 43 percent doing something regarding
expert systems. Banks have 60 percent.
Texas Instruments will merge the Data Systems Group to the Comptuer
systems Group. AI activities were in the former.
Gensym will offer G2 on HP 9000 system. (real time xpert system)
Lucid has joint marketing agreement to sell products in Japan.
Aion Corporation and Cincom systems have cooperative marketing
agreement.
Intelligent Technology will be distributing ClienTrak
relationship management system. It manages Key sales activities.
A bridge between for V. I. Dataviews interactive graphics and
Neuron NEXPERT object will be developed by the companies.
Canadian Artificial Intelligence Products has received grant from
Telecom Canada to develop hypertext system.
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Date: Mon, 8 Aug 88 11:42:58 CDT
From: smu!leff@uunet.UU.NET (Laurence Leff)
Subject: bm953
Summary of
Spang Robinson Report on Supercomputing and Parallel Prcessing
July 1988, Volume 2, No. 7
Lead Issue is on "Linda"
14 VAXen losely coupled outperformed CRAY-1 on a Compute-Intensive
task at Sandia. Linda is a Yale-developed
package being enhanced by Scientific Computing Associates.
They have versions for Encore, Sequent. Implementations have been
developed for shared memory systems rimarily but can be run
on INtel Scinetific systems. Implementations of Linda exist for Fortran,
Lisp and Pascal.
U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7U7
Applied Intelligent systm has developped a masive machine vision systems
using a proprietary chip featuring eight single-bit processes. It is similar
to the Thinking machine. The system ranges from a one board system
with sixty-four processing elements to one with 1024 processor elements.
A new system will have a 32-processor chips. A new system will have
10 MFLOP system at $500.00. They also have a product called LAYERS
which provides an object-oriented C-based system.
()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()()
The next article is on the Kartashevs who hold various Supercumputing
conferences. However, some people find the "kartashev style" abrasive.
A competing conference, "Supercomputing World 1989" is a reaction
against the system.
%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%^%
Shorts:
Cray received orders for its CRAY 2S from:
National Center for Supercomputer Applications, University of Illinois
National Test Bed Facility at Falcon Airforce installation
Cray YMP
Ohio State University Ohio Supercomputer Center
Shell Research B. V., Exploration Lab, Netherlands
Saxpy will be selling its technology and assets.
Sequent will be joining with Franz and Quintus to offer versions of
LISP and Prolog for their system.
Parasoft will be reselling DEfinicon's add-in Transputer boards.
Floating Point System reported a quarterly loss of 7.3 million.
Multiflow layed off 25 person in manufacturing.
MASSCOMP reported $250,000 revenues.
ETA announces "native UNIX" System V on its system.
Encore announced a fully parallel ADA for the Multimax configuration. It
received the fastest completion time for the Ada Validation Suite on record.
Sequent announced a version of X-Windows for its systems.
Pacific Cyber/Metrix announced a 250 MIPS VMEBus Data flow machine.
The basisc system consisiting of four processors costs $20,300.
Japanese government has announced a 640 MFLOP dataflow system.
It has 128 processors and 128 microprocessors to data read/store.
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Date: 3 Aug 88 18:17:44 GMT
From: Martin-Charles@yale-zoo.arpa (Charles Martin)
Subject: Re: Will computers dominate chess? (was Re: Computers &
Chess)
In article <35187@aero.ARPA>, srt@aero (Scott R. Turner) writes:
Lenat's EURISKO program was innovative enough in Starfleet Battles that
it was eventually barred from tournament play - after having invented a
new winning strategy two years running.
Surely you mean /Trillion Credit Squadron/. Also, my impression is that
EURISKO was not solely responsible for the strategies; considerable editing
was required by Lenat, adjustment of weights, etc. I believe he cited some
figure such as 60/40 Lenat/EURISKO, which if nothing else at least reflects
his own estimation of the limitations of this program applied to this task.
TCS, while requiring large amounts of data for the various weapon and
defensive systems, is an extremely simple game. It is the large amount of
data which makes it difficult for humans to "grasp" the game. The TCS
system was designed to be simple---as the previous three-dimensional game
of maneuver was too complex for people to play with more than a couple of
ships. Concepts at the level of "fork," basic to tic-tac-toe and chess, do
not play a role in TCS.
The EURISKO line of research was not pursued (as far as I am aware) into
more complex games with less human intervention.
Charles Martin // INTERNET: martin@cs.yale.edu // BITNET: martin@yalecs
UUCP: {cmcl2,harvard,decvax}!yale!martin
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Date: 3 Aug 88 19:47:36 GMT
From: att!alberta!jonathan@bloom-beacon.mit.edu (Jonathan Schaeffer)
Subject: Re: computer chess
In article <376@ksr.UUCP>, richt@breakpoint.ksr.com (Rich Title) writes:
> There's a Carnegie Mellon PhD thesis by Carl Eberling,
> that was published (by MIT press
> I think) under the title "All the Right Moves". It describes HiTech,
> the current world computer chess champion. That thesis in turn
> points to other papers on computer chess.
Hitech is NOT the World Computer Chess Champion. In the last championship
in 1986, there was 1 4-way tie for first place between Cray Blitz,
Hitech, Bebe, and Phoenix. Cray Blitz was awarded first place on tiebreak.
"All the Right Moves" is a good thesis, but is not the best place to
look for references. The International Computer Chess Journal is published
quarterly with the latest in research results, tournaments, games, etc.
That is the best place to look. Also, several computer chess bibliographies
have been published. Perhaps the most comprehensive, albiet slightly out of
date, is Tony Marsland's (available as a technical report from the University
of Alberta).
> Carnegie Mellon seems to be *the* place for computer chess.
> Hans Berliner, former postal chess champion, is a comp sci
> professor there.
CMU is only one of a number of places with active computer chess groups.
Others include University of Alberta, McGill University, University of
Limburg, Bell Labs, Los Alamos National Lab, etc.
> The techniques used in the top machines such as HiTech represent
> impressive engineering, but aren't what most people think of
> as "AI". Very fast searching, aided by hardware that generates
> and evaluates moves in parallel and evaluates positions
> in parallel.
True, but that is not all the things people are doing in computer chess.
As it stands right now, the strongest chess playing machines are more
engineering than science. But do not underestimate the scientific
component of computer chess. A lot of this work may not be high profile
unless it is incorporated as part of a winning chess program, but it
is still important, core AI research.
> - Rich
- Jonathan
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End of AIList Digest
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