1,712 research outputs found
kLog: A Language for Logical and Relational Learning with Kernels
We introduce kLog, a novel approach to statistical relational learning.
Unlike standard approaches, kLog does not represent a probability distribution
directly. It is rather a language to perform kernel-based learning on
expressive logical and relational representations. kLog allows users to specify
learning problems declaratively. It builds on simple but powerful concepts:
learning from interpretations, entity/relationship data modeling, logic
programming, and deductive databases. Access by the kernel to the rich
representation is mediated by a technique we call graphicalization: the
relational representation is first transformed into a graph --- in particular,
a grounded entity/relationship diagram. Subsequently, a choice of graph kernel
defines the feature space. kLog supports mixed numerical and symbolic data, as
well as background knowledge in the form of Prolog or Datalog programs as in
inductive logic programming systems. The kLog framework can be applied to
tackle the same range of tasks that has made statistical relational learning so
popular, including classification, regression, multitask learning, and
collective classification. We also report about empirical comparisons, showing
that kLog can be either more accurate, or much faster at the same level of
accuracy, than Tilde and Alchemy. kLog is GPLv3 licensed and is available at
http://klog.dinfo.unifi.it along with tutorials
Approaches to Interpreter Composition
In this paper, we compose six different Python and Prolog VMs into 4 pairwise
compositions: one using C interpreters; one running on the JVM; one using
meta-tracing interpreters; and one using a C interpreter and a meta-tracing
interpreter. We show that programs that cross the language barrier frequently
execute faster in a meta-tracing composition, and that meta-tracing imposes a
significantly lower overhead on composed programs relative to mono-language
programs.Comment: 33 pages, 1 figure, 9 table
Improving Prolog programs: Refactoring for Prolog
Refactoring is an established technique from the object-oriented (OO)
programming community to restructure code: it aims at improving software
readability, maintainability and extensibility. Although refactoring is not
tied to the OO-paradigm in particular, its ideas have not been applied to Logic
Programming until now.
This paper applies the ideas of refactoring to Prolog programs. A catalogue
is presented listing refactorings classified according to scope. Some of the
refactorings have been adapted from the OO-paradigm, while others have been
specifically designed for Prolog. The discrepancy between intended and
operational semantics in Prolog is also addressed by some of the refactorings.
In addition, ViPReSS, a semi-automatic refactoring browser, is discussed and
the experience with applying ViPReSS to a large Prolog legacy system is
reported. The main conclusion is that refactoring is both a viable technique in
Prolog and a rather desirable one.Comment: To appear in Theory and Practice of Logic Programming (TPLP
Probabilistic Programming Concepts
A multitude of different probabilistic programming languages exists today,
all extending a traditional programming language with primitives to support
modeling of complex, structured probability distributions. Each of these
languages employs its own probabilistic primitives, and comes with a particular
syntax, semantics and inference procedure. This makes it hard to understand the
underlying programming concepts and appreciate the differences between the
different languages. To obtain a better understanding of probabilistic
programming, we identify a number of core programming concepts underlying the
primitives used by various probabilistic languages, discuss the execution
mechanisms that they require and use these to position state-of-the-art
probabilistic languages and their implementation. While doing so, we focus on
probabilistic extensions of logic programming languages such as Prolog, which
have been developed since more than 20 years
CHR as grammar formalism. A first report
Grammars written as Constraint Handling Rules (CHR) can be executed as
efficient and robust bottom-up parsers that provide a straightforward,
non-backtracking treatment of ambiguity. Abduction with integrity constraints
as well as other dynamic hypothesis generation techniques fit naturally into
such grammars and are exemplified for anaphora resolution, coordination and
text interpretation.Comment: 12 pages. Presented at ERCIM Workshop on Constraints, Prague, Czech
Republic, June 18-20, 200
An overview of the ciao multiparadigm language and program development environment and its design philosophy
We describe some of the novel aspects and motivations behind
the design and implementation of the Ciao multiparadigm programming system. An important aspect of Ciao is that it provides the programmer with a large number of useful features from different programming paradigms and styles, and that the use of each of these features can be turned on and off at will for each program module. Thus, a given module may be using e.g. higher order functions and constraints, while another module may be using objects, predicates, and concurrency. Furthermore, the language is designed to be extensible in a simple and modular way. Another important aspect of Ciao is its programming environment, which provides a powerful preprocessor (with an associated assertion language) capable of statically finding non-trivial bugs, verifying that programs comply with specifications, and performing many types of program optimizations. Such optimizations produce code that is highly competitive with other dynamic languages or, when the highest levéis of optimization are used, even that of static languages, all while retaining the interactive development environment of a dynamic language. The environment also includes a powerful auto-documenter. The paper provides an informal overview of the language and program development environment. It aims at illustrating the design philosophy rather than at being exhaustive, which would be impossible in the format of a paper, pointing instead to the existing literature on the system
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