SOPHIE: a pragmatic use of artificial intelligence in CAI

This paper describes a fully operational AI-CAI system (accessible over the ARPANET) which incorporates Artificial Intelligence techniques to perform question answering, hypothesis verification and theory formation activities in the domain of electronic troubleshooting. Much of its logical or inferencing capabilities are derived from uses of simulation models in conjunction with numerous procedural specialists. The system also includes a highly tuned structural parser for allowing the student to communicate in natural language. Although the system is extremely large it is sufficiently fast to be thoroughly exercised in a training or classroom environment.