English

Value withdrawal explanations: a theoretical tool for programming environments

Software Engineering 2007-05-23 v2

Abstract

Constraint logic programming combines declarativity and efficiency thanks to constraint solvers implemented for specific domains. Value withdrawal explanations have been efficiently used in several constraints programming environments but there does not exist any formalization of them. This paper is an attempt to fill this lack. Furthermore, we hope that this theoretical tool could help to validate some programming environments. A value withdrawal explanation is a tree describing the withdrawal of a value during a domain reduction by local consistency notions and labeling. Domain reduction is formalized by a search tree using two kinds of operators: operators for local consistency notions and operators for labeling. These operators are defined by sets of rules. Proof trees are built with respect to these rules. For each removed value, there exists such a proof tree which is the withdrawal explanation of this value.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.cs/0207050,
  title  = {Value withdrawal explanations: a theoretical tool for programming environments},
  author = {Willy Lesaint},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:cs/0207050},
  year   = {2007}
}

Comments

14 pages; Alexandre Tessier, editor; WLPE 2002, http://xxx.lanl.gov/abs/cs.SE/0207052