TY - THES AU - Li, Vincent PY - 1990 TI - Knowledge representation and problem solving for an intelligent tutoring system KW - Thesis/Dissertation LA - eng M3 - Text AB - As part of an effort to develop an intelligent tutoring system, a set of knowledge representation frameworks was proposed to represent expert domain knowledge. A general representation of time points and temporal relations was developed to facilitate temporal concept deductions as well as facilitating explanation capabilities vital in an intelligent advisor system. Conventional representations of time use a single-referenced timeline and assigns a single unique value to the time of occurrence of an event. They fail to capture the notion of events, such as changes in signal states in microcomputer systems, which do not occur at precise points in time, but rather over a range of time with some probability distribution. Time is, fundamentally, a relative quantity. In conventional representations, this relative relation is implicitly defined with a fixed reference, "time-zero", on the timeline. This definition is insufficient if an explanation of the temporal relations is to be constructed. The proposed representation of time solves these two problems by representing a time point as a time-range and making the reference point explicit. An architecture of the system was also proposed to provide a means of integrating various modules as the system evolves, as well as a modular development approach. A production rule EXPERT based on the rule framework used in the Graphic Interactive LISP tutor (GIL) [44, 45], an intelligent tutor for LISP programming, was implemented to demonstrate the inference process using this time point representation. The EXPERT is goal-driven and is intended to be an integral part of a complete intelligent tutoring system. N2 - As part of an effort to develop an intelligent tutoring system, a set of knowledge representation frameworks was proposed to represent expert domain knowledge. A general representation of time points and temporal relations was developed to facilitate temporal concept deductions as well as facilitating explanation capabilities vital in an intelligent advisor system. Conventional representations of time use a single-referenced timeline and assigns a single unique value to the time of occurrence of an event. They fail to capture the notion of events, such as changes in signal states in microcomputer systems, which do not occur at precise points in time, but rather over a range of time with some probability distribution. Time is, fundamentally, a relative quantity. In conventional representations, this relative relation is implicitly defined with a fixed reference, "time-zero", on the timeline. This definition is insufficient if an explanation of the temporal relations is to be constructed. The proposed representation of time solves these two problems by representing a time point as a time-range and making the reference point explicit. An architecture of the system was also proposed to provide a means of integrating various modules as the system evolves, as well as a modular development approach. A production rule EXPERT based on the rule framework used in the Graphic Interactive LISP tutor (GIL) [44, 45], an intelligent tutor for LISP programming, was implemented to demonstrate the inference process using this time point representation. The EXPERT is goal-driven and is intended to be an integral part of a complete intelligent tutoring system. UR - https://open.library.ubc.ca/collections/831/items/1.0098429 ER - End of Reference