Using ASP for knowledge management with user authorization

  • Authors:
  • Lingzhong Zhao;Junyan Qian;Liang Chang;Guoyong Cai

  • Affiliations:
  • State Key Laboratory of Software Engineering, Wuhan University, Wuhan, 430072 China and School of Computer and Control, Guilin University of Electronic Technology, Guilin, 541004 China;School of Computer and Control, Guilin University of Electronic Technology, Guilin, 541004 China;School of Computer and Control, Guilin University of Electronic Technology, Guilin, 541004 China;School of Computer and Control, Guilin University of Electronic Technology, Guilin, 541004 China

  • Venue:
  • Data & Knowledge Engineering
  • Year:
  • 2010

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Abstract

Unlike conventional rule based knowledge bases (KBs) that support monotonic reasoning, a key correctness issue, i.e. the correctness of a sub-KB with respect to the full KB, arises when using a KB represented by non-monotonic reasoning languages such as Answer Set Programming (ASP). Since a user may have rights to access only a subset of a KB, the non-monotonic nature of ASP may cause the occurrence of consequences, which are erroneous in the sense that the consequences are not reasonable in the full KB. This paper proposes an approach dealing with the problem. The main idea is to let the usage of Closed World Assumptions (CWAs) for literals in a KB satisfy certain constraints. Two kinds of access right propositions are created, rule retrieval right propositions to control the access to rules, and CWA right propositions to control the usage of CWAs for literals. Based on these right propositions, this paper first defines an algorithm for translating an original KB into a KB tagged by right propositions, and then discusses the right dependency in a KB and proposes methods for checking and obtaining a set of rights that is closed under a set of dependency rules. Finally, several results on the correctness of a set of rights in a KB are presented, which serve as guidelines for the correct use of a KB. As an example, a KB of illness-related financial support for teachers of a university is presented to illustrate the application of our approach.