The RHET System: A Sequence of Self-Guided Tutorials

The RHET system is a knowledge representation tool that is intended to support the development of advanced prototype natural language under- standing and planning systems. It is what is currently called a "hybrid" representation, which consists of a set of separately defined specialized reasoning systems that are presented to the user within a single uniform framework. It can be used as a horn-clause based theorem proving system, or it can be used as a rich frame-based representation, or used in any way falling between these styles of use. The primary specialized reasoning components include a type hierarchy system, an equality reasoning system, a temporal reasoning system, and a hierarchical context mechanism that support reasoning about different agent''s beliefs as well as hypothetical reasoning. This report provides a sequence of tutorials each demonstrating a major feature of the system.