Enhancing the Efficiency of a Decision Support System through the Clustering of Complex Rule-Based Knowledge Bases and Modification of the Inference Algorithm

Decision support systems founded on rule-based knowledge representation should be equipped with rule management mechanisms. Effective exploration of new knowledge in every domain of human life requires new algorithms of knowledge organization and a thorough search of the created data structures. In this work, the author introduces an optimization of both the knowledge base structure and the inference algorithm. Hence, a new, hierarchically organized knowledge base structure is proposed as it draws on the cluster analysis method and a new forward-chaining inference algorithm which searches only the so-called representatives of rule clusters. Making use of the similarity approach, the algorithm tries to discover new facts (new knowledge) from rules and facts already known. The author defines and analyses four various representative generation methods for rule clusters. Experimental results contain the analysis of the impact of the proposed methods on the efficiency of a decision support system with such knowledge representation. In order to do this, four representative generation methods and various types of clustering parameters (similarity measure, clustering methods, etc.) were examined. As can be seen, the proposed modification of both the structure of knowledge base and the inference algorithm has yielded satisfactory results

Knowledge Discovery in Rule-Bases

International audienceIn rule based, automated management systems, knowledge is represented explicitly as long as it is necessary for the functioning of the system. However, some knowledge which might be quite useful for maintenance purposes, remains implicit and disseminated in the rule base. We present an original approach for the discovery of such implicit knowledge, based on machine learning techniques. We will illustrate the use of our approach in the book-keeping domain, where it has proven its interest within the scope of an industrial project