Knowledge assimilation in deductive databases

Abstract

Deductive databases, also called knowledge bases, generalize traditional data­ bases as well as expert systems. Semantic foundations of knowledge bases are summarized. Knowledge assimilation comprises the topics of integrity checking, belief revision and consistency checking. We sketch what these tapies are about, by outlining a spectrum of degrees .of knowledge assimilation. The resulting scale may serve as a measure of the proficiency of systems far knowledge assimilation. Each of the three topies is also characterized on its own. Integrity checking is dealt with in more detail, since it is also a constituent part of belief revision and is shown to be useful far improving the efficiency of consistency checking.