ISC 320 - Expert Systems and Knowledge Engineering

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I. COURSE NUMBER AND CREDIT:

        ISC 320 - 3 S. H.

II. COURSE TITLE:

        Expert Systems and Knowledge Engineering

III. COURSE DESCRIPTION:

        Techniques for the construction of expert systems
        including computer inference and knowledge
         acquisition; knowledge representation schemes;
        conceptual date analysis; plausible reasoning
        techniques; validation and measurement methods;
        production-rule programming.

IV. PREREQUISITES:

        ISC 110, CSC 212, and CSC 221

V. JUSTIFICATION:

VI. COURSE OBJECTIVES:

        1.  Students will be able to explain and describe the
            concepts central to the creation of knowledge
            bases and expert systems.
        2.  Students will be knowledgeable about the tools
            and the processes used for the creation of an
            expert system.
        3.  Student will know methods used to evaluate the
            performance of an expert system.
        4.  Students will be able to conduct an in-depth
            examination of an existing expert system with
            an emphasis on basic methods of creating a
            knowledge base.
        5.  Students will be able to examine properties of
            existing systems in a case-study manner,
            comparing differing approaches.

VII. COURSE OUTLINE:

        A.  Introduction
            1.  The history of knowledge-based expert systems
            2.  Characteristics of current expert systems
            3.  Basic concepts for building expert systems
        B.  Building and Expert System
            1.  The architecture of expert systems
            2.  Constructing an expert system
            3.  Tools for building expert systems
        C.  Evaluating an Expert System
            1.  Reasoning about reasoning
            2.  Issues and case studies
        D.  Language and Tools for Knowledge Engineering
        E.  A Case Study in Knowledge Engineering

VIII. METHODS OF INSTRUCTION:

        The primary mode of instruction will be lectures with
        emphasis on basic concepts and applications of these
        concepts.  Textbook readings will be supplemented by
        primary source material.  Assignments which require
        students to apply specific concepts will be regularly
        given.

IX. COURSE REQUIREMENTS:

X. MEANS OF EVALUATION:

        Grades will be determined based upon periodic
        examinations.

XI. RESOURCES:

XII. BIBLIOGRAPHY:

        Barr, A. & Feigenbaum, E. A. (eds).  The Handbook of
           Artificial Intelligence, (volumes 1-3).  William
           Kaufmann, Inc., 1981, Los Altos, CA.
        Buchanan, B. B. & Shortliffe, E. H.  Building Expert
           Systems with Production Rules:  The Mycin
           Experiments.  Addison-Wesley Publishing Company,
           Inc., 1983, Reading, MA.
        Cohen, D. N. & Stone, H. (eds).  Knowledge-Based
           Theorem Proving and Learning.  UMI Research Press,
           1981, Ann Arbor, MI.
        Coombs, M. J.  Developments in Expert Systems.
           Academic Press, 1984, NY.
        Davis, R. & Lenat, D. B.  Knowledge-Based Systems in
           Artificial Intelligence.  McGraw-Hill
           International Book Company, 1982, NY.
        Elcock, E. W. & Michie, D. (eds).  Machine
           Intelligence:  Machine Representations of
           Knowledge.  Halsted Press, 1977, NY.
        Fahlman, S. E.  NETL:  A System for Representing and
           Using Real-World Knowledge.  MIT Press, 1979,
           Cambridge, MA.
        Hayes-Roth, F., Waterman, D. A. & Lenat, D. B. (eds).
           Building Expert Systems.  Addison-Wesley
           Publishing Company, Inc., 1983, Reading, MA.
        Michalski, R. S., Carbonell, J. G. & Mitchell, T. M.
           (eds).  Machine Learning:  An Artificial
           Intelligence Approach.  Tioga Publishing Company,
           1983, Palo Alto, CA.
        Negoita, C. V.  Expert Systems and Fuzzy Systems.
           Addison-Wesley Publishing Company, Inc., 1984,
           Reading, MA.
        O'Shea, T. & Eisenstadt, M.  Artificial Intelligence:
           Tools, Techniques, and Applications.  Harper & Row 
          Publishers, Inc., 1984, NY.
        Sowa, J. F.  Conceptual Structures:  Information
           Processing in Mind and Machine.  Addison-Wesley
           Publishing Company, Inc., 1984, Reading, MA.
        Torsun, I. S. Expert Systems:  State of the Art (or
           Principles).  Addison-Wesley Publishing Company,
           Inc., 1983, Reading, MA.