Robert Nado

Information integration with attribution support for corporate profiles

The proliferation of electronically available data within large organizations as well as publicly available data (e.g. over the World Wide Web) poses challenges for users who wish to efficiently interact with and integrate multiple heterogeneous sources. This paper presents CI3, a corporate information integrator, which applies XML as a tool to facilitate data mediation and integration amongst heterogeneous sources in the context of financial analysts creating corporate profiles. Sources include Lotus Notes, relational databases, and the World Wide Web. CI3 applies a unified XML data model to automate integration. By preserving metadata about the source of each datum in the integrated result set, CI3 supports source attribution. Users may trace the attribution metadata from the result back to the underlying sources and leverage their expertise in interpreting the data and, if necessary, use their judgment in assessing the authenticity and veracity of results. We present a functional overview of CI3, its system architecture including the XML data model, and the integration procedures. We conclude by reflecting on lessons learned.

COMET: An Application of Model-Based Reasoning to Accounting Systems

An important problem faced by auditors is gauging how much reliance can be placed on the accounting systems that process millions of transactions to produce the numbers summarized in a companys financial statements. Accounting sys-ems contain internal controls, procedures designed to detect and correct errors and irregularities that can occur in the processing of transactions. In a complex accounting system, it can be an extremely difficult task for the auditor to anticipate the possible errors that can occur and evaluate the effectiveness of the controls at detecting them. An accurate analysis must take into account the unique features of each companys business processes. To cope with this complexity and variability, the COMET system applies a model-based reasoning approach to the analysis of accounting systems and their controls. An auditor uses COMET to create a hierarchical flowchart model that describes the intended processing of business transactions by an accounting system and the operation of its controls. COMET uses the constructed model to automatically analyze the effectiveness of the controls in detecting potential errors. Price Waterhouse auditors have used COMET on a variety of real audits in several countries around the world.

Saying more with frames: Slots as classes

Abstract A major deficiency of many assertional frame systems is the limited expressiveness of the frame languages that they provide. Many quite simple assertions cannot be stated directly in the frame language, but instead must be expressed less straightforwardly using rules or attached procedures. We describe here two conceptually straightforward extensions to a basic frame system that significantly extend its expressive and inferential power while maintaining the advantages of conceptual simplicity and efficiency of implementation. The first extension is to treat a slot as a representation of the set of its values, and to use the full power of the frame language recursively to describe that set as a class. The second extension is to allow the portion of a class frame that describes the members of the class to contain self references, which are replaced during inheritance by references to the particular class member that inherits the description. We present an implemented frame language that includes these extensions together with rules specifying the inferences performed by the frame systems inheritance algorithms.

JOSIE: an integration of specialized representation and reasoning tools

We present an overview of an implemented knowledge system development tool, called JOSIE, that provides a general framework for integrating specialized representation and reasoning facilities. In our presentation we emphasize the problematic issues that arise when integrating specialized representations and the distinctive features of the facilities included in the system. The current system includes assertion, retraction, and query facilities using a predicate-calculus style interface language, a default sentential representation for the interface language, an inference rule language and forward chaining interpreter based on the interface language, a justification-based truth maintenance system that supports restricted nonmonotonic proofs, a frame-based specialized representation system that provides arbitrarily nested slot descriptions and default slot values, and a constraint language and reasoner within the frame system that provides both constraint propagation and symbolic solution of linear equations via Gaussian elimination.

Performing deduction from implicit beliefs

An implemented knowledge-based system tool, called JOSIE is presented, that allows specialized representations to be efficiently integrated into a uniform framework. As with previous systems of this type, JOSIE allows different kinds of knowledge to be represented differently. Specialized representations are used to improve an application systems efficiency. One way they gain efficiency is by representing some of their beliefs implicitly. The authors have identified two problems with integrating such specialized representations with a forward-directed rule system. The rule invocation problem is the problem of ensuring that rules are triggered from implicit beliefs. The implicit dependency problem is the problem of integrating dependency maintenance, performed by a specialized representation with a general-purpose truth maintenance system. A solution to these problems is presented for a broad class of specialized representations.<<ETX>>