Linking typed feature formalisms and terminological knowledge representation languages in natural language front-ends

Abstract

In this Paper we describe an interface between typed formalisms and terminological languages like KL-ONE. The definition of such an interface is motivated by the needs of natural language front-ends to AI-systems where information must be transmitted from the front-end to the back-end system and vice versa. We show some minor extensions to the feature formalism allow for a syntactic description of individual concepts in terms of typed feature structures. Namely, we propose to include intervals and a special kind of sets. Partial consistency checks can be made on these concepts descriptions during the unification of feature terms. Type checking on these special involves calling the classifier of the terminological language. The final consistency check is performed only when transferring these concept description into structures of the A-Box of the terminological language.