Use of meta-knowledge in an expert system: a real case application

A description is given of a system, called M-EXPAIR, that makes use of meta-knowledge for generalizing and improving expert system efficiency. M-EXPAIR is the follow-up of a preliminary version of an expert system designed for diagnostic applications in the domain of radar equipment. This system uses a knowledge base containing both a physical and a functional description of the equipment and the history concerning the past diagnosis. M-EXPAIR is a variant of a structured production system such that the rules in the fired rule classes are dynamically updated during diagnosis. An example for a radar display device is described to illustrate the actual implementation of M-EXPAIR