obrien@aerospace.aero.org (Mike O'Brien) (03/22/90)
We're looking for samples of an expert system that's truly object-oriented, whatever that means. One thing it does mean is that it's not just another set of rules. We know about Humble and that doesn't count: though it's written in Smalltalk it's basically just another expert system shell like many others, and things don't really get object-oriented till you go outside it to write special Smalltalk code. What IS an OO expert system? Any takers? -- Mike O'Brien obrien@aerospace.aero.org
noren@dinl.uucp (Charles Noren) (03/23/90)
In article <69312@aerospace.AERO.ORG> obrien@aerospace.aero.org (Mike O'Brien) writes: >We're looking for samples of an expert system that's truly object-oriented, > [stuff deleted]. >What IS an OO expert system? Any takers? One expert system I've played with is G2 by Gensym (Cambridge, MA (617)547-9606). It has some OO features, but is not a OO expert system. Some of its features: 1. A graphics oriented environment where objects usually have a graphics icon representation. The language provides primatives that allow the icons to move, rotate, change color, be created or destroyed. 2. A "class" definition scheme that specifies [single] inheritence, instance attributes of the class, icon graphic description, and categories this class definition can be placed in. 3. A rule system that can manipulate object instances, classes, and attributes. The rules can be activated by forward and backward chaining, by time, and any specified changes to existing objects. 4. A procedural language that can be called from the rules. 5. An optional interface to C. 6. A simulation engine. Objects, definitions, etc., are developed one "workspaces", which can be nested in a hypercard fashion. G2 does not support the concept of methods tied to classes and objects. G2 is a nice prototyping tool. It has a context sensitive editor and its rule syntax is "english-oriented". We have used it to develop network management applications. Now that I've been converted into the OO religion :-) I wish there were more OO features in G2. We have found that it provides enough interesting features to rapidly put together an application with developers who don't have experience in Lisp or other AI languages. -- Chuck Noren NET: ncar!dinl!noren US-MAIL: Martin Marietta I&CS, MS XL8058, P.O. Box 1260, Denver, CO 80201-1260 Phone: (303) 971-7930