On a knowledge-based system for dimensional analysis

✍ Scribed by Madan Venugopal; Steven H. Kim

• Publisher: Elsevier Science
• Year: 1990
• Tongue: English
• Weight: 751 KB
• Volume: 3
• Category: Article
• ISSN: 0952-1976
• DOI: 10.1016/0952-1976(90)90004-6

✦ Synopsis

Knowledge-based systems to date, whether in engineering or other fields, have tended to incorporate facts, heuristics and algorithms specific to narrow domains of application. As a result, these systems are fragile; they fail catastrophically when the underlying assumptions are violated or they are applied to unforeseen circumstances. A robust system, on the other hand, should encode deep knowledge relating to first principles and general techniques for reasoning about the entire field of application. A general-purpose engineering assistant should encode models of the domain as well as reasoning techniques that apply to diverse arenas of technology. This paper takes a step in the direction of generalized engineering tools by examining how techniques for dimensional analysis may be encoded in software. The goal of the current work is the development of a prototype system to demonstrate the feasibility and utility of such an approach.