ABSTRACT
This chapter presents programming the expert system (ES) for plant fault diagnosis in a data manipulation language (DML) of a relational database. The dBASE or K-MAN language on a personal computer is used as the DML. The chapter provides inference, explanation, and other modules of the ES are programmed as application software which creates, modifies, and accesses the databases. It demonstrates the ES through applications to the fault diagnosis of the ship engine cooling system. The chapter introduces a knowledge acquisition and representation scheme of incremental refinement type. It also allows the utilization of checklists and fault trees as knowledge sources other than the human experts themselves. The resultant expert knowledge is visible as an AND/OR tree. The chapter analyses structures of a knowledge base consisting of three databases. IF-THEN rules and other information such as rule justifications, fact confirmation methods, and plant recovery measures are stored in the databases supervised by the DML.
