Episodic refinement of episodic skeletal-plan refinement

This paper describes the reformulation of the episodic skeletal-plan refinement (ESPR) problemsolving method (PSM) in a new framework that seeks to integrate knowledge-based applications with a temporal data-abstraction and data-management system. In this framework, both applications and temporal-data managers are encapsulated as CORBA objects. We found that we need to reformulate the method ontology, mapping relations, and control structure of the PSM in this framework. Our experience suggests that PSMs are not necessarily fixed structures that can be plugged into arbitrary application environments, and that we need to develop a flexible configuration environment and expressive mapping formalisms to accommodate the requirements of application environments. These requirements include the ways data are made available and the ways software components interact with each other.