Visual Knowledge Capture for the Development of Expert Systems

S&K Electronics is proposing a visual programming environment for developing expert systems in CLIPS. This project will be known as the Visual Expert System Programming Resource, or VESPR. The visual environment will provide a graphical interface for easily capturing knowledge and converting it into the appropriate language constructs; it will also provide visualization of the system being developed. VESPR will also automatically provide ¿scaffolding¿ to simplify the development of features common to expert systems. By using an existing expert system development language, the project will be able to leverage the work already done on the language and have an existing pool of potential users available. The most important asset that NASA owns is flight knowledge. How to fly space vehicles. This knowledge is unique to NASA, and most of it is confined to a few experienced flight controllers and mission specialists. Expert systems can represent that knowledge in a permanent, flexible, and useful fashion. The knowledge can be saved and used easily. Unfortunately, creation of an expert system is an expensive, time-consuming task, requiring, at a minimum, both an expert who possesses the knowledge that needs to be captured, and an expert programmer.