Analysis of the behavior of logic-based computation for deductive databases and default reasoning

摘要

One advantage of logic programming is the ability to use formal logic to analyze program behavior. Formal logic provides a basis for demonstrating that a program will behave as the user intends. This paper attempts to present to the non-logician known program behavior results for logic programs in the context of deductive databases. Previous results are extended through an investigation of a class of programs more general than logic programs. Specific attention is given to computational approaches which involve the solution of a finite sequence of progressively larger integer linear programming problems (ILP's). Constraints for such problems are constructed by a form of logical unification. Results indicate that under certain conditions the solution to the last ILP yields a Herbrand model for the original set of statements in logic.