Marksjo, Bertil Sharpe, Ron Holmes, John Fitchett, Paul Ho, Fanny
Verschenen in:
Civil engineering & environmental systems
Paginering:
Jaargang 6 (1989) nr. 1-2 pagina's 36-43
Jaar:
1989
Inhoud:
The Australian Standard, Minimum Design Loads on Structures: Part 2-Wind Loads (AS 1170.2) has been extensively revised, and many comments made during the public revision have been incorporated. The text has also been represented in a rule-based form using expert systems techniques, providing further input to the SAA Committee work by checking for logical inconsistencies and, in addition, using graphical input to enhance use of the Code and to avoid input errors. The paper will show how AS 11 70.2 (hereafter called the Wind Code) has been transferred into knowledge-based form, pointing out some of the problems that have been encountered and are likely to occur during any similar process: A Code text written for manual use will, in general, not be as well organized, complete and logically consistent as a computer software version requires to avoid failure. The computer version of the document must be understood by the experts to make validation of the knowledge base possible. Only very expensive commercial expert system shells give sufficient support for table handling and advanced mathematics. This has now been overcome by the development of C functions in the CSIRO BX-shell and subsequently ported into the CRYSTAL shell. Explanation facilities in the form of pictures, text and line of reasoning have to please both experts and end users. A 'fast track' for experienced users has to be provided to avoid wasting time with unnecessary questions. The present version of WINDLOADER, written originally in the CSIRO BX-shell has now been ported to the CRYSTAL (IBM PC-based) shell and also partly to an object-oriented version under the NEXPERT OBJECT shell, interfaced to Hyper-card on a colour Mac II.