PROVERB review

From: Kevin Wampler (wampler@cs.washington.edu)
Date: Sun Dec 05 2004 - 18:44:44 PST

  • Next message: Ravi Kiran: "(no subject)"

    In "PROVERB: The Probabilistic Cruciverbalist" Keim et. at. describe the
    design and performance of their crossword solving program (PROVERB). In
    concert with the diverse nature of the skills needed to solve a
    crossword, this program combines many artificial intelligence
    techniques. For example, candidates are chosen by expert modules (which
    may employ natural language processing techniques), are merged with a
    probabilistic model, and then filled in a grid by solving for a
    optimization with constraint satisfaction problem. The reasonable
    success of this program provides a good illustration of how some
    difficult problems can be solved by combining multiple AI concepts.

    This strength of showing the power of combining multiple AI methods is
    also one of the weaknesses in the solver. The actual construction of
    the solver, although it uses many elegant methods, is rather ad hoc.
    This is particularly evident in the expert modules, but many of the
    choices made in other parts of the solver also reflect this trait. This
    means that although the system does illustrate a combination of
    techniques well, it is not particularly useful in solving other AI
    problems. This would likely be the most fruitful path for future work
    (difficulty aside). It would be particularly useful to show a single
    unified approach which could solve crossword puzzles, as it would likely
    be applicable to a variety of other problems.


  • Next message: Ravi Kiran: "(no subject)"

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