Running the Prolog program + extending the knowledge base
Which Prolog interpreter should I use? I've seen GNU Prolog and SWI-Prolog mentioned online. The download on the page is a zip file — what's inside exactly? Is there a README?
SWI-Prolog is what we recommend — it's free, well-maintained and works on Windows/Mac/Linux. The zip contains engine.pl, data.pl and library.pl. Once SWI-Prolog is installed, open a terminal, navigate to the folder and run: swipl Then inside the interpreter type: consult('engine.pl'). then: start. and the diagnostic program will begin.
Got it running on SWI-Prolog! The PSU branch has incredibly detailed questions. I went through the full diagnosis on my old PC that wouldn't boot and it correctly identified that I should check for swollen capacitors on the motherboard — and there they were! Genuinely useful program.
The explanation system is the most impressive part for me — it traces back through every inference step it took to reach the conclusion. This is exactly how classical expert systems work and it's a great teaching example. I'm extending the knowledge base to add GPU diagnostics (black screen, artifacting, VRAM errors). The edge/vertice_data structure makes it very easy to add new branches. Would love to share the extended version if there's interest.
Used this as the basis for my university AI assignment! My professor was really impressed by the state machine architecture and how cleanly the knowledge base is separated from the inference engine. Got full marks. Thank you Robotics and Energy for making this available — the detailed explanation of each Prolog predicate in the article was extremely helpful for understanding what's actually happening.
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