Method and system for simplified knowledge engineering

• US 10,068,172 B2
• Filed: 08/29/2013
• Issued: 09/04/2018
• Est. Priority Date: 09/20/2012
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: IfWizard Corporation
• Original Assignee: IfWizard Corporation
• Inventors: Sellers-Blais, Dominic
• Primary Examiner(s): Chaki, Kakali
• Assistant Examiner(s): Wu, Fuming
• Application Number:
  US14/014,073
• Publication Number:
  US 20140081892A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,832 Days
• Field of Search: None
• CPC Class Codes: G06N 5/02 Knowledge representation; Symbolic representation
• CPC Class Codes: G06N 5/025 Extracting rules from data
• CPC Class Codes: G06N 5/04 Inference or reasoning models
• CPC Class Codes: G06N 7/00 Computing arrangements based on specific mathematical models

Abstract

A system and method is disclosed for knowledge engineering using a computerized graphical editor to manage and create knowledge-based systems containing a navigable graph of modal pages with conditional content and user interface knowledge. The invention enables the entire knowledge engineering workflow to be performed within a non-technical graphical environment and without requiring a computer programming or mathematical background. Further, the presentation of knowledge as modal pages allows for simple ontological discovery and end-user player operation. Once editing is complete, the method allows for the set of pages, variables, and settings of which the knowledge-based system is composed to be exported into an independently executable knowledge-based system player containing an embedded inference engine.

Claims

1. A non-transitory, machine readable storage manufacture having stored thereon computer program code for execution by a processor, the computer program code comprising:

a graphical editor for building an expert system; and

a player component configured to execute the expert system;

the graphical editor comprising a page editor component configured to interactively build page entities of the expert system, wherein exactly one of the page entities is identified as a start page to be displayed when execution of the expert system is commenced, each page entity consisting of;

one or more content sections and one or more interface sections,

wherein each content section of the page entity is constrained to consist of non-interactive static blocks of informational content for display, without any executable elements or interactive elements, and

each interface section comprising;

at least one widget to acquire input data via a user interface device coupled to the processor, and

at least one interface result entity, the interface result entity identifying at least one of (a) a destination page, and (b) one or more result conditions;

and further identifying one or more specified actions which are to be performed only if the result conditions are true;

the player component arranged to access the start page entity, display the content section of the start page entity, acquire the input data from the user interface device, based on the input data, update zero or more stored variables of the expert system;

and then, access the interface result entity of the start page, test the result conditions based on current values of the stored variables, determine whether the result conditions are true, and if the result conditions are true, executing the actions specified in the interface result entity;

if the interface result entity of the start page specifies a destination page entity, navigate to the destination page entity, display the content section of the destination page entity, acquire second input data from the user interface device, based on the second input data, update zero or more stored variables of the expert system; and

repeat the steps of executing one page entity at a time of the expert system, navigating from each currently displayed page to a selected destination page as determined by analyzing the interface result entity of the currently displayed page;

the graphical editor further including an export subsystem configured to convert the page entities into a portable format to export the expert system for use by an independently executable player system, wherein exported expert system is self-contained, meaning capable of execution without specialized tools, plugins, external programs or access to a knowledge base, as the subject matter expert knowledge for the expert system is captured and reflected in the page entities.

2. The storage manufacture of claim 1, wherein:

each of the interface result entities defines zero or more result actions;

each of the result actions consists of setting a value of a selected output variable based on applying a single selected action mechanism to one or more inputs;

the graphical editor implements a graphical user interface that enables selection of the input from a limited set of choices consisting of a selected variable, a constant, and an input value acquired by a widget; and

the selected variable is selected from a predefined set of variables that is under exclusive local control of the expert system.

3. The storage manufacture of claim 2 wherein the result action is configured, when invoked during execution of the expert system, to execute a predetermined action including one or more of setting a variable, opening an external document, uploading data to other servers, and integrating with a container through a container integration subsystem coupled to the graphical editor.

4. The storage manufacture of claim 1 wherein each result action optionally is associated to one or more result conditions, and the corresponding result action is executed if and only if all of the associated result conditions are met, and wherein

the graphical editor includes a graphical user interface that enables selection of each result condition from a predetermined set of condition mechanisms.

5. The storage manufacture of claim 1 wherein the computer program code includes a player component configured to:

access a portable exported expert system generated by the export subsystem of the graphical editor; and

execute the portable exported expert system independently without specialized tools, plugins, external programs or access to a knowledge base;

wherein executing the exported expert system comprises—

first display the content section of the start page;

next display the interface section of the start page including the widget;

utilizing the widget, acquire input data via the user interface device;

based on the acquired input data and the interface result entity of the interface section, navigate to a corresponding destination page; and

repeat the foregoing steps, beginning with displaying the content section of the destination page, so that during execution exactly one page of the expert system is displayed at a time.

6. The storage manufacture of claim 5 wherein the player component is further configured to:

first navigate to the start page;

conditionally display the content section of the start page on the display screen;

conditionally display the interface section of the start page on the display screen, including invoking an applicable widget for user interaction;

conditionally execute applicable results of the interface section based on the user interaction with the widget;

navigate to a destination page associated with the result; and

repeat the following steps utilizing the destination page, and then continue cycling to subsequent destination pages executing the foregoing steps until a termination condition is encountered.

7. The storage manufacture of claim 1 wherein a page entity stores a value for a stored variable in a content section.

8. The storage manufacture of claim 1 wherein the result entity includes zero or more associated result actions that, when invoked during execution of the expert system, assign a value to at least one stored variable.

9. The storage manufacture of claim 1 wherein the page editor component is arranged for providing a condition for a content, user interface or result, wherein display of a particular contents/interfaces or execution of result actions are each conditioned on a corresponding test.

10. The storage manufacture of claim 9 wherein a condition determines a corresponding truth value by applying a selected operation to a selected operand, wherein the operand comprises one of the stored variables, a constant literal, or a value input to a widget.

11. The storage manufacture of claim 10 wherein the selected operation is one of a set of operations that includes “

pattern matches”

, “

more than or equals”

, “

more than”

, “

less than or equals”

, “

less than”

, “

ends with”

, “

contains”

, “

equals”

, and the negated result of each of the foregoing.