Expert systems for foundation design

Expert system technology has been brought from Artificial Intelligence research laboratories to the real world over the last decade. However, to date, there are few expert systems that have been developed for foundation design work. The problems are due to technical and psychological factors and are similiar to those when computers were firstly introduced. In this thesis, the difficulties of building expert systems for foundation engineering application are identified. The work in this thesis is an attempt to study the applicability of expert systems to foundation design and find solutions to existing difficulties. The thesis explores ways in which geotechnical engineers can be persuaded to accept the technology and develop their own systems, or to use developed systems to assist their work. Features of conventional expert systems are investigated, modified and improved such that the developed systems are more suitable for foundation design work and engineers may have more confidence in developing systems or using the developed systems. Three ways of building expert systems are studied and compared in terms of flexibility, user and developer-friendliness, user-confidence, and validation of the developed system. The three ways involve: i) using Turbo PROLOG to encode the system from ‘scratch’, ii) using a development tool (also termed a shell in this thesis), and iii) using a spreadsheet. A new shell is specifically designed and developed to facilitate the second approach. Examples of systems for geotechnical application using each approach are described in detail in this thesis