CONSTRUCTION OF PROBLEM-SOLVING METHODS AS PARAMETRIC DESIGN

The knowledge-engineering literature contains a number of approaches f or constructing or selecting problem solvers. Some of these approaches are based on indexing and selecting a problem solver from a library, others are based on a knowledge acquisition process, or are based on s earch-strategies. None of these approaches sees constructing a problem solver as a configuration task that could be solved with an appropria te configuration method. We introduce a representation of the function ality of problem-solving methods that allows us to view the constructi on of problem solvers as a configuration problem, and specifically as a parametric design problem. From the available methods for parametric design, we use propose-critique-modify for the automated configuratio n of problem-solving methods. We illustrate this approach by a scenari o in a small car domain example. (C) 1998 Academic Press.