Premium
Expert System for Planning the Establishment of Turfs
Author(s) -
Liu H.,
Fermanian T.W.,
Carmer S.G.
Publication year - 1991
Publication title -
agronomy journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.752
H-Index - 131
eISSN - 1435-0645
pISSN - 0002-1962
DOI - 10.2134/agronj1991.00021962008300010032x
Subject(s) - lawn , expert system , set (abstract data type) , knowledge base , quality (philosophy) , engineering , selection (genetic algorithm) , transport engineering , computer science , ecology , artificial intelligence , philosophy , epistemology , biology , programming language
Establishing or renovating sites are routine events in the management of turfgrasses. Advice from turf experts on the design of the new turf is not always readily available, due to limitations on information about design and utility parameters. Knowledge‐based advisory systems, commonly called expert systems, have shown great potential for planning tasks. TURFPLAN, an expert planning system, was constructed principally for turf managers, Extension staff, educators, contractors, etc. The major design tasks of TURFPLAN are the selection of turfgrass species and their cultivars, establishment procedures, and maintenance procedures during the post‐planting period. Expert System Environment (ESE) was selected as the development platform for TURFPLAN. A portion of the rules covering the selection of turfgrass cultivars was developed from examples using AURORA, an inductive learning system. An evaluation of TURFPLAN's performance was conducted by comparing a set of generated designs to comparable designs developed by turf experts. The TURFPLAN design for a medium maintenance turf (home lawn) was ranked significantly superior to human produced designs. TURFPLAN establishment designs for low maintenance turfs (i.e., highway rights of way) and high maintenance turfs (i.e., golf course greens) were ranked significantly poorer than designs developed by human experts. The TURFPLAN knowledge base currently does not have an adequate quantity of knowledge specifically related to the establishment of low or very high maintenance level turfs. This evaluation indicated that a knowledge‐based planning system may provide turf establishment designs of high quality for home lawns in Illinois. This method of evaluation also establishes a systematic procedure for evaluating knowledge‐based systems.