Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site ssc-vax.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!microsoft!uw-beaver!ssc-vax!sts From: sts@ssc-vax.UUCP (Stanley T Shebs) Newsgroups: net.ai Subject: Re: Expectations of expert system technology Message-ID: <345@ssc-vax.UUCP> Date: Mon, 25-Jul-83 18:11:37 EDT Article-I.D.: ssc-vax.345 Posted: Mon Jul 25 18:11:37 1983 Date-Received: Tue, 26-Jul-83 10:47:31 EDT References: <1824@utcsrgv.UUCP> Organization: Boeing Aerospace, Seattle Lines: 29 Expert systems technology is an experimental field whose basic concepts have been fairly well established in the past few years. Since it is really an engineering field (knowledge engineering) much of the important research is carried on by attempting to develop a specific application and seeing what sorts of problems and solutions crop up. This is true for MYCIN, R1, PROSPECTOR, and many other expert systems. Our Expert Systems Technology group at Boeing has been developing a prototype flight route planner. It has provided a good test bed for more theoretical work on the kinds of tools and capabilities needed for knowledge engineering (although as a planner, it may never be fully functional). Our application is sufficiently difficult that it is quite experimental, however a simple expert system is not particularly difficult to put together, if some of the existing and available tools are used. Needless to say, many sweeping generalizations and unjustified assumptions (read: gross hacks) must be made, in order to simplify the problem to a point where an expert system can be built. The resulting expert system, although perhaps not much more capable than a good C program, will be much smaller and more transparent in structure than any ordinary program. The ad in question may or may not be reasonable. I don't know enough about finance to say whether the knowledge in that domain can be easily encoded. However, if the company's expectations are not too high, they may end up with a reasonable tool, one that will be just as good as if some C wizard had spent a year of sleepless nights reinventing the AI wheels. Stan ("the Leprechaun Hacker") Shebs Boeing Aerospace Co. ssc-vax!sts (soon utah-cs)