Knowledge Acquisition Tools, Methods, and Mediating Representations
John H. Boose · 1990
Acquiring and modeling knowledge effectively can be the most time-consuming portion of the knowledge engineering process. Little methodology is practiced beyond unstructured interviewing. Automated methods are, for the most part, still in the research stage. Several well-known factors contribute to interviewing problems: o Plausible lines of reasoning can have little to do with actual problem-solving. o Academic (novice) knowledge is often obtained in place of compiled (expert) knowledge. o Experts may be insecure. They could be afraid of losing their jobs; they may not want computers encroaching on their "private domain; " they may not want to expose their problem-solving methods to the scrutiny of colleagues or of the general public. o Interpersonal interviewing problems can result when knowledge engineers are not trained in interviewing techniques. o There are inherent problems in introspection. o Protocol analysis (discussed below) is labor intensive, error-prone, and results in a series of random behavior samples that must be synthesized by the knowledge engineer. Clancey summarized the problem as follows (1986b): "Knowledge acquisition is not just a problem of accessing and translating what is already known, but the familiar