EMAS

The purpose of this thesis is to design a database for videotex from the view point of a Graphic Designer without ignoring technological aspects. I am dealing with a problem that has been overlooked and needs to be addressed the problem of database structure, search procedure, and retrieval of information for videotex. The goal is to design a database for videotex that will give the user ease of manipulation of information and better retrieval of that information with high interactivity and massive random access

IkeaBot: An autonomous multi-robot coordinated furniture assembly system

We present an automated assembly system that directs the actions of a team of heterogeneous robots in the completion of an assembly task. From an initial user-supplied geometric specification, the system applies reasoning about the geometry of individual parts in order to deduce how they fit together. The task is then automatically transformed to a symbolic description of the assembly-a sort of blueprint. A symbolic planner generates an assembly sequence that can be executed by a team of collaborating robots. Each robot fulfills one of two roles: parts delivery or parts assembly. The latter are equipped with specialized tools to aid in the assembly process. Additionally, the robots engage in coordinated co-manipulation of large, heavy assemblies. We provide details of an example furniture kit assembled by the system.Boeing Compan

A Comparative study of four major knowledge representation techniques used in expert systems with an implementation in Prolog

Knowledge representation is a central issue in Artifical Intelligence (AI) research. In order to solve the diverse and complex problems encountered, one needs both a large amount of knowledge and some mechanism for the management and skillful utilization of that knowledge. The basic problem in knowledge representation is the development of an adequate formalism to represent that knowledge. In this thesis I will discuss four of the major techniques for representing knowledge in expert systems: first order logic, production rules, semantic networks, and frames. Using Prolog as the implementation language, I will demonstrate that all of the above mentioned representation techniques, when used in actual implementations, will be reduced to an equivalency - that being a set of Prolog facts and rules. Prolog limits us to a set of facts expressed as predicate(argumentl, argument, ..., argumentn) and IF ... THEN rules, thus eliminating many of the unique features which characterize the various representation techniques. Therefore, Prolog can be viewed as a representation technique itself

Reference and the facilitation of search in spatial domains

This is a pre-final version of the article, whose official publication is expected in the winter of 2013-14.Peer reviewedPreprin