epitec@majestix.ida.liu.se (Epitec AB) (11/21/89)
****************************************************************************** NAME/VERSION: Epitool 4.0 PRESENT STATUS: Product (sold by Epitec and Digital Equipment Corporation) COST: USD 15.000 and up (depending on hardware) CONTACT: Anders Englund or Your local Epitec AB Digital Equipment S:t Larsgatan 12 Representative S-582 24 LINKOPING SWEDEN Phone: Int +46 (13) 11 40 75 AVAILABILITY: Nordic countries: Worldwide: Epitec AB Digital Equipment Corporation INTENDED USERS: Software and Knowledge Engineers DOMAIN/CATEGORY(IES): General tool REPRESENTATION FORMALISMS (3 items, 6 lines): Epitool offers a rich hybrid knowledge representation language, combining the power of rule-based, object-oriented and procedural problem solving. Objects: Inheritance, Message passing, User defined typing, Deamons Rules: Symmetrical forward and backward chaining, Pattern matching Procedures: Elan (syntax like Pascal/Ada) used in Rules, Objects and Procedures BASE LANGUAGE: VAX Lisp (not visible in tool) OS/HARDWARE: VAX/VMS VMS V5.1 DECWindows V1.0 16Mb physical memory 25000 blocks available disk space 70000 blocks pagefile SYSTEM INTERFACES: Call-in and Call-out to/from programming languages conforming to the VAX Internal Calling Standard (eg Pascal, Cobol, Fortran, C, Ada, etc) USER INTERFACES: Command interface on terminals (eg vt100, vt200, etc) Graphic interface on workstation and DECwindows terminals. Users develop their application interfaces in DECWindows using UIL or the X-Toolkit. SHORT DESCRIPTION (15 lines): Using one uniform pascal-like language (Elan) the developer utilizes the powers of the rule-based, object-oriented and procedural knowledge representation paradigms. Epitool comprises Epitool/DE (Development Environment) and Epitool/EE (Execution Environment) wich constitute efficient tools for both development and delivery of large-scale knowledge systems. Epitool/DE is designed for use in the development phases of applications. It provides the knowledge engineer with advanced aids including debugging and analysis services, specialized editors and a variety of object browsers. Epitool/EE is optimized for efficient execution of completed applications. Attributes, methods, deamons, multiple inheritance, active values, forward and backward chaining, pattern matching, rule sets, procedures, modules, graphics, dialogues, explanations, debugging, timing, etc. COMPATIBILITY: Using Epitool/EE it is possible to create shareable, executable images of the application. EFFICIENCY: A unique, optimizing compilation of the knowledge base accomplishes the transfer of an application from the powerful Epitool/DE to the cost- effective runtime environment Epitool/EE. The gains in this transfer is 10-fold in licence fees, 2-fold in memory requirements and 5-10 fold in execution speed (depending on the application). NUMBER OF INSTALLATIONS: 100 APPLICATIONS (3 items, 12 lines): Process control (Pulp washing): Supervising and occasionally interfering with existing control equipment in the pulp washing plant of Frovifors Paper Mill has resulted in improved quality, less downtime and energy savings. Configuration (Cargo monitoring equipment): Saab Marine Electronics sells equipment for monitoring cargo on ships. A system was developed that configures equipment using customer requirements. The results are shortened order handling time. Interpretation (Business control): Interpreting economic results in one of Digital Equipments organizations has led to earlier discovery of business problems, faster and more adequate decisions. FURTHER DEVELOPMENTS: Interface to SQL. Compilation to Ada and C. RELATED WORK: Epitool is a member of the group of hybrid tools offering object oriented, rule oriented and procedural programming. One major exception is that there is a uniform representation language that is used in all actions. This language is an important prerequisite for the efficient compilation of a knowledge base. ******************************************************************************