PHRAN-SPAN: A Natural Language Interface for System Specifications

This paper describes a natural language interface, PHRAN-SPAN, for specifying the abstract behavior of digital systems in restricted English text. A neutral formal representation for the behavior is described using the USC Design Data Structure. A small set of concepts that characterize digital system behavior are presented using this representation. Finally, an intermediate representation based on Conceptual Dependencies is presented. Its use with a semantic-based parser to translate from English to the formal representation is illustrated by a series of examples.