Computers in Industry 17 (1991) 91-100
Elsevier
IMS '91--Learning in IMS
Machine learning in engineering automation
The present and the future
Bradley L. Whitehall a n d Stephen C-Y. Lu
Knowledge-Based Engineering Systems Research Laboratory, Department of Mechanical and Industrial Engineering, and Beckman
Institute for Advanced Science and Technolog3', Universitv of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana. IL 61801, USA
This paper describes how engineers can use machine learning
techniques to improve their productivity. The current use of
machine learning in engineering automation is described, and
areas of future research are discussed. Machine learning pro-
grams are able to identify useful concepts from data. Recogniz-
ing relationships from the plethora of data enhances the
knowledge an engineer can use for problem solving. In the
future, machine learning programs will interact with existing
computer tools to enhance productivity and to assist the en-
gineer by suggesting ideas remembered from past problem
solving sessions. Machine learning can increase the power of
programs for engineering and can help the engineer learn
about problems and domains.
Keywords: Machine learning, Machine learning requirements,
Engineering automation, Intelligent engineering.
1. Introduction
In the past decade the computer has become an
indispensable tool to the engineer. This trend will
continue with more innovative software applica-
tions being developed to use the ever increasing
power of new processors. To continue the large
gains in engineering productivity (even with in-
creased computational speed) software programs
will need to be more intelligent. One method of
making programs that can increase productivity in
engineering automation is to have them learn while
they perform a task.
In this paper, machine learning in engineering
automation is discussed. Current machine learning
programs learn concepts that can help to increase
engineering productivity by recognizing relation-
0166-3615/91/$03.50 ~3 1991 - Elsevier Science Publishers B.V. All rights reserved
91
ships and trends in the plethora of data available
to the engineer. In the future, machine learning
programs will interact with existing computer tools
to enhance their productivity and also act as an
associate to the engineer by suggesting ideas
learned from past problem solving sessions. Ma-
chine learning cannot only increase the power of
software programs for engineering, but can also be
used to help the engineer learn about problems
and domains. For example, constructing an expert
system often helps an organization to better un-
derstand the problem the system is solving. This
new understanding goes beyond what is captured
in the knowledge base, because the organization
was forced to look at the problem in a method-
ological manner. In conjunction with expert sys-
tems, machine learning can be used to help an
organization understand aspects of problems in
greater detail than might have occurred otherwise.
With machine learning capabilities, a program can
identify concepts and important features of a
problem without the biases humans impose upon
solutions.
This paper consists of three major sections. The
next section describes machine learning tech-
niques from a user's viewpoint, i.e., what is re-
quired to use these systems and what is the output
obtained. Section 3 describes how machine learn-
ing can be used in engineering automation today.
Section 4 explains where machine learning re-
search is heading and what it implies for intelli-
gent engineering software in the future. This is
followed by closing remarks.
92 IMS ' 9 1 - Learning in IMS
2. Machine learning: An engineering perspective
Machine learning algorithms are often cate-
gorized by the type of knowledge provided to the
system and the transformations performed by the
learner in order to apply the knowledge. Figure 1
is such a hierarchical classification of learning
systems. In the rest of this section, four different
types of learning systems are presented: database,
deductive machine learning (DML), inductive
machine learning (IML), and integrated machine
learning (Integ-ML). Database learning methods
are used extensively by engineers today. Deductive
machine learning and inductive machine learning
systems have been researched for a number of
years and can now be used to help with specific
engineering problems. Research with integrated
machine learning systems is just beginning; these
learning approaches will be useful in the future.
StephenC-Y. Lu received his MS and
PhD degrees from Mechanical En-
gineering and Robotics Institute of
Carnegie-Mellon University, Pins-
burgh, PA. He is currently a tenured
Associate Professor and the founding
Director of the Knowledge-Based En-
gineering Systems Research Labora-
tory in the Mechanical and Industrial
Engineering Department at the Uni-
versity of Illinois at U r b a n a -
Champaign (UIUC). He is also a Re-
search Associate Professor of the
Computer Science Department and the Beckman Institute for
Advanced Science and Technology at UIUC. His research
interests are in the development of artificial intelligence based
techniques for advanced engineering automation, and in the
integration of these techniques with traditional engineering
methods. Currently, he is developing the knowledge processing
technology to support various concurrent engineering and sys-
tem management tasks• He has published over 100 technical
papers, reports, and book chapters in this area, and served as a
keynote speaker for several national and international con-
ferences. Professor Lu is an associate editor of the Journal of
Engineering for Industry, ASME Transactions, and the Interna-
tional Journal of Computer-Integrated Manufacturing Systems.
He also serves on several editorial committees including SME
Transactions, Journal of Intelligent Manufacturing, and the In-
ternational Journal of System Automation. He has organized
many technical conferences and workshops, and was the
Chairperson of the 1986 A S M E Symposium on Knowledge-
Based Expert Systems for Manufacturing and the 1989 A S M E
Symposium on Concurrent Product and Process Design. He is
an active member of ASME, SME, IEEE, and AAAI, and has
served as a technical consultant and expert panelist to various
industries and federal agencies. He received the Presidential
Young Investigator (PYI) Award from the National Science
Foundation in 1987, the Outstanding Young Manufacturing
Engineer Award from the Society of Manufacturing Engineers
in 1988, and was selected as an Outstanding Young M a n of
America in 1988. In 1990, he received the Xerox Senior Faculty
Research Award from U I U C for his high quality research
accomplishments over the previous five years. In the same
year, he was also appointed as a University Scholar for his
excellent contributions to scholarly activities.
'( ,.,mpuWr~ :n induste~
ML
Data DMI_ IML lnf~l_
!
• /// '
,., ~. ~ ' ,,,
Rote I ~ !
Fig 1, Hierarchical classificalfim ,,i machine Icaruing
2.1. Database learning
Systems that learn hy met];orizing prevtousl?
seen results and facts perform database learning
Database learning systems make no inductive gen-
eralizations from the input data provided. They
remember the facts that are entered and can pro-
vide summaries from subsets c,f the facts based
upon provided instructions.
Two types of database learning are role learn-
mg and learning by instruction [1]. Rote learning
stores the initially given facts and recalls them
when the correct key is provided. Learning b~'
instruction occurs when a system remembers given
facts, but recalls information m a form different
than initially provided. An example for an en-
Bradley L. Whitehall received his MS
and P h D from the Department of
Computer Science at the University ol
Illinois at U r b a n a - C h a m p a i g n in the
area of artificial intelligence. Dr
Whitehall is currentl,/ with United
Technologies Research Center, East
Hartford. CT, The work described m
this paper was completed while he was
a Postdoctoral Research Associate
with the Knowledge-Based Engineer-
ing Systems Research Laboratory in
the Mechanical and Industrial En-
gineering Department at the University of Illinois at Urbana
Champaign. His research interests include applying machine
learning techniques to engineering problems and using artifi-
cial intelligence to improve design processes. He has publica-
tions at conferences in artificial intelligence both in the United
States and Europe, He managed a major section of the Robols
and Beyond." The Age of Intelligent .Machines development
effort at the University of Illinois. (A request from the Boston
M u s e u m of Science for major universities to demonstrate
artificial intelligent systems for the general public.) Recently,
he was the co-developer of the first cognitive science course at
the University of Illinois. The aim of the course is to give the
student an overview of all the areas of cognitive science (artifi-
cial intelligence, psychology, neural biology, anthropology, and
linguistics). Dr. Whitehall has conducted industrial seminars
on artificial intelligence and machine learning and has been
involved with companies applying machine learning techniques
to production problems. He a member of the organizing com-
mittee for the session Machine Learning in Engineering Auto-
mation at the Eighth International Workshop on Machine
Learning.
Computers in Industry B.L. Whitehall, S. C- Y. Lu / Machine learning in engineering automation
gineering system is providing a summary of statis-
tics for a subset of the input data.
Most engineers use programs with database
learning capabilities frequently. They do not con-
sider a spread sheet program to be learning. Such
systems are so common place that their usefulness
is taken for granted. In the future, engineers will
use these learning systems with other computer
tools and more complex learning systems to in-
crease productivity.
2.2. Deductive machine learning
Deductive learning [2,3] works with an existing
knowledge base to make it more efficient (faster).
Deductive learning can improve the performance
of a knowledge-based system by adding rules that
combine knowledge already existing in the knowl-
edge base. The new rules compile (cache) knowl-
edge that is used for many types of problems. The
new rules allow the inference engine to work ex-
pediently because only one rule is required where
many rules (along with pattern matching and
chaining involved in using those rules) were re-
quired to solve the problem.
To learn a new rule, deductive learning systems
must be provided with a training example, The
learning system assumes that the knowledge base
is complete and correct. The system constructs a
proof of the solution for the training solution,
recording how variables are instantiated and which
rules are used. Deductive learners generalize the
proof structure to create a new rule which can
then be used by the inference engine as though it
was an originally provide piece of knowledge.
Next time a problem similar to the training prob-
lem is encountered, the system can use the learned
rule instead of constructing the solution from ini-
tial principles. Deductive learning is also called
explanation-based learning (EBL) because the
proof or explanation of the solution is constructed
from the training example.
Explanation-based learning is useful when a
class of problems use many of the same rules. A
new rule can be learned to speed up the knowl-
edge-based system's performance on this problem
class. For example, generative computer-aided
process planning systems use knowledge to pro-
duce plans. If a number of parts presented to the
system use the same rules in constructing the plan,
a new rule can be constructed. If the training
93
example requires a plan for machining slots, the
new rule will improve the speed with which plans
for slotted parts are produced.
The EBL system ARMS [4] learns plans for a
robotic arm. The system is provided a plan for
assembling a part. The system uses its background
knowledge to understand the plan and generalize
it. The generalized plan can then be used by the
robotic arm to assemble similar parts. The gener-
alized plan helps the robotic arm work in situa-
tions where the provided parts are in different
positions from the training example, making the
assembly process more robust.
2.3. Inductive machine learning
Inductive machine learning systems produce a
concept description for a class of data by identify-
ing characteristics that distinguish one class from
other classes. For a system to do this, a large
number of examples must be compared. In gen-
eral, the more examples provided, the more accu-
rate the concept description will be. IML systems
generalize from the specific examples provided
when constructing the concept description. The
generalized concept description is useful for iden-
tifying unseen examples because rules can be con-
structed of the form:
concept description ~ data class.
The generalized rule can provide insight to an
engineer by highlighting aspects of the data that
would go unnoticed without this analysis tool.
Two types of inductive learning are discussed
next. Learning from example systems construct
concept descriptions for preclassified examples.
Discovery systems are provided with a set of un-
classified data and must classify the examples and
learn the concept descriptions for those classes.
There are symbolic and subsymbolic (con-
nectionist or neural net) approaches for both types
of inductive learning. Both approaches are useful
for different types of problems. The focus of this
paper is on symbolic approaches, because the rules
produced can provide insight to the user in a more
comprehensible representation. Subsymbolic ap-
proaches can learn functionally equivalent concept
descriptions, but weights on network links do not
help in understanding a solution to a problem.
94 1MS '91~-Learning in I M S
2.3.1. Learning from examples
Learning from example (LFE) systems induce
general concepts from a set of classified examples
[5 7]. The simplest case is when two classes are
provided, positive and negative. LFE systems learn
a concept of the positive class by comparing at-
tribute values for the examples and finding combi-
nations of the values that describe examples
labeled as positive but do not label (or label only a
few of) the negative examples. If only a few exam-
ples are provided these systems find descriptions
that do not fully described the desired concept.
The use of learning from example systems for
systhesis tasks are described in Section 3.1.
2.3.2. Discovery
Machine learning systems can provide useful
information even when given unlabeled examples.
discovering important classes of data as well.
Numerical clustering techniques are used by en-
gineers and scientists to provide insight to data.
Discovery systems can provide the same type of
insight, but can group examples based upon fea-
tures other than numerical distance. Machine
learning systems can classify examples based upon
the conceptual cohesiveness on the examples [8-10].
One such measure is finding simple explanations
for the groupings of data. (Section 3.1 describes a
situation where discovery was used in an engineer-
ing domain.)
Another type of discovery system finds
mathematical formulas that describe a set of data
[11,12]. These systems discover equations covering
sets of the data points provided. Events are classi-
fied by the equations, which are the concept de-
scriptions. Equations are particularly useful de-
scriptions because they can be used with other
numerical systems.
2,4. Integrated machine learning
There are two ways that machine learning sys-
tems can be integrated. One approach is to in-
tegrate a number of learning systems that use
knowledge in the same form (e.g., classified exam-
ples). The new integrated learning system consists
of a tool box of learning techniques. In order to
make this integrated tool useful, a program is
written to determine which of the tools should be
used for a given problem, An even better system
decomposes the problem into subproblems and
( ~mputer.~ m lndu.str'.,
tries the learning techniques on all the subprob-
lems. Thus, different parts of the problem can be
solved by different learning tools to increase the
overall performance the rules learned [13]. (This
approach is described in more detail in Section
3.1.)
The second approach to integrating machine
learning systems is to combine the capabilities of
DML and IML systems by using knowledge from
both examples and background knowledge. These
types of systems will become more important m
the future because they allow an engineer to pro-
vide more guidance to the learning ~ystem, even
when complete knowledge is lacking, Two forms
of this integrated learning system approach are
presented: knowledge-based learning (KBL) [14]
and analogy [15].
2.4.1. Knowledge-based learning
KBL systems allow induction from examples to
be guided by background knowledge. KBL sys-
tems work with the inference engine of an experl
system. When an inference engine cannot solve a
problem, KBL uses heuristics to determine possi-
ble extensions to the knowledge base that would
allow a solution to be found. For each selected
extension a partial proof structure is constructed
(similar to EBL). The proof structure is used to
collect a subset of the provided examples and
induction is performed over the subset of exam-
ples to create a rule. The new rule is then used to
allow the inference engine to complete the prob-
lem.
The KBL1 system [14] has learned rules for an
expert system that determines phase timings for
intersection stop lights. KBLI was provided with
an incomplete set of rules for configuring phase
timings, a set of previously solved examples, and
an intersection for which a timing could not be
found. By using the provided rules to construct a
context for the unsolved problem, Kin,1 selected
solved examples that match that context and in--
duced a new rule.
2.4.2. Analogy
Analogy systems try to solve one problem by
looking at solutions to other types of problems.
These systems must first find a mapping from the
new problem to a previously solved problem. The
relevant aspects of the solved problem are trans-
Computers in Industry B.L. Whitehall, S. C-E Lu / Machine learning in engineering automation
formed to apply to the unsolved problem. Per-
forming these mappings is very difficult. The anal-
ogy system must generalize aspects of the prolems
to find a match and to apply the solution to the
new problem. Background knowledge about the
problems and solutions is required to help guide
this induction and problem selection. (Hall [16]
provides a comparison of a number of analogy
systems.) It is difficult to use analogy in engineer-
ing systems today because the approach is com-
plex and ill-defined. However, research is under-
way in using analogy to assist in mechanical des-
ign [17].
3. Machine learning used in engineering today
Although machine learning systems cannot
construct large knowledge-based systems for en-
gineering at this time, learning systems are useful
to engineers in a number of areas. In this section a
number of general engineering problems are de-
scribed along with how machine learning systems
can assist in solving those problems. In each area
described, at least one machine learning approach
has been applied and the results of the learning
systems have been used by engineers or in con-
junction with other computer systems.
3.1. Data and knowledge synthesis
The knowledge synthesis task is defined as the
transformation process from a set of raw data into
knowledge that can be used to fulfill a specific
goal in a particular domain. This synthesis process
is commonly seen in engineering decision making
activities where, given a set of facts (from experi-
ments a n d / o r simulations), the engineer is ex-
pected to come up with a model (or an interpreta-
tion) which properly describes the given facts and
accurately predicts new facts. Traditional tech-
niques such as statistical regressions, optimization
methods, etc., have been used to aid such processes.
Regardless of their respective strengths and weak-
nesses, a common limitation of these traditional
techniques is that they are difficult to comprehend
and subject to human bias.
Machine learning systems can be used to aid
synthesis processes. Learning from example sys-
tems and conceptual clustering (discovery) sys-
tems create knowledge about data. Provided with
95
a set of examples, learning from example systems
determine which aspects of the data distinguish
between the classes. The concept description pro-
duced by LFE captures the important attributes
and values for a particular class. An engineer can
use this description to better understand the data.
When each event has a large number of attributes,
the class descriptions produced by LFE remove
the unimportant attributes and allows a user to
focus on the important attributes. Although learn-
ing systems do have biases, they are logical. (Typi-
cal biases for machine learning systems are: pro-
duce short descriptions, produce descriptions that
cover the most examples, produce as few disjuncts
as possible.) When humans create knowledge from
data, ill defined biases often influence the results.
An example of how machine learning al-
gorithms can be used to construct a comprehen-
sive model from data is presented in [13]. The
AIMS systems is used to construct a model of a
simulator for tool cutting. AIMS induces rules defi-
ning the outcome of the simulator for different
classes of input examples. The system can produce
rules that are very accurate but complex, and less
accurate rules that are easier to comprehend. Thus,
the system can produced a hierarchy of rules from
least c o m p l e x / a c c u r a t e to most c o m p l e x /
accurate. The rules can be used for different deci-
sion making processes during engineering depend-
ing upon the time available to construct a model,
the accuracy of results currently required, and
desired detail.
Discovery systems also create knowledge about
data that is useful to an engineer. Conceptual
clustering programs place events into classes that
have clear concept descriptions. While numerical
taxonomy systems can also produce clusterings,
often no comprehensive description of the cluster-
ings can be found. Conceptual clustering systems
have been used for group technology [18]. CLUS-
TER/2 [19] was given a set of parts described with
a set of features. The system constructed a classifi-
cation of the parts based upon the conceptual
cohesiveness of the parts. The descriptions pro-
duced had meaning to the engineers using the
clusterings.
3.2. System integration
After knowledge has been systhesized from
data, it can be integrated with the qualitative
96 / M S ' 9 1 - - L e a r n i n g in I M S
Problem
Solution
_j-
~Unsolved
\ //
Example
Fig. 2. Knowledge-based learning approach to knowledge integration.
knowledge acquired from domain experts through
interviews. Therefore, inductive learning, which is
used as a tool for knowledge synthesis, also pro-
vides a base for the knowledge integration task to
develop more comprehensive domain models- a
complete collection of all the available knowledge
about a specific task of interest. This integration
can occur in two distinct ways. First, the rules
produced by an inductive learning system can be
presented to an expert during knowledge acquisi-
tion. The expert can then critique the machine
generated rules. It is often easier for an expert to
modify rules that are almost correct than to gener-
ate rules from nothing. The I M L rules can assist
in getting more data from the expert. A second
form of integration occurs when an expert cannot
provide rules for a detailed phenomenon, but can
provide examples of the phenomenon. The expert
can provide higher level rules for the system, and
an expert system can learn rules for the lower level
specifics.
Knowledge-based learning systems can be used
to integrate knowledge from the engineer and the
rules produced by an inductive learning system, as
shown in Fig. 2. When the inference engine of an
~ :~mpute::~ m lndusfr;
1
/ Rules
\ ,...Ut
~¢ules
':///
Examples
expert system cannot solve a problem, the KBL
system is called. KBL uses the knowledge provi-
ded by the engineer (the same knowledge used b~.
the expert system) to guide an inductive module
within KBL. The induced rules '.~re then added t~,
the knowledge base to allow the problem to be
completed.
3. 3= Prediction
Machine learning systems can be used to pre--
dict outcomes of events in a couple of ways. First,
the systems can be used to predict the class of a
given input example. As shown earlier, IML sys-
tems produce concept descriptions by generalizing
the input events. If a new example is seen that
matches the concept description for a class, we
can predict that the event belongs to that class.
The concept description does not have to specify a
single class. The Probabilistic Learning System
(PLS) [20] learns rules that classify an event into a
category with a probability. For example, if an
event matches one concept description it would
have an 80% chance of being a positive event and
a 20% change of being a negative event. Another
Computers in Industry B.L. Whitehall, S. C- Y. Lu / Machine learning in engineering automation
description might give the event a 40% chance of
being positive. Subsymbolic systems are also use-
ful for this task.
Inductive learning systems have been used for
computer security [21]. These systems learn rules
that characterize the behavior of a computer user.
The rules predict the sequences of commands nor-
mally typed in by a user. When the predicted
pattern is not matched, the system notes the ex-
ception. When enough exceptions are identified.
the system indicates that a user is not following
their normal patterns, and the account security
might be violated.
Learning systems can also be used to predict
the values of attributes of events based upon the
other known attribute values. Discovery systems
such as COBWEB [10] can be used to construct
classifications of events. If the system is then
given an event with a known class, but some
attribute values are missing, those attribute values
can be inferred. The neural net approach of inter-
attire activation and competition [22] allows a net-
work to infer missing attribute values of an incom-
plete event.
3.4. Adaptive monitoring control
Machine learning systems can be used to moni-
tor and control complex processes. If those
processes can be decomposed into a fixed number
of s t a t e / a c t i o n pairs then symbolic learning is
appropriate, otherwise subsymbolic computing
might give better results. To apply learning to
such situations, the systems must see examples of
the relevant states along with the actions required.
This decomposition makes the control problem
similar to a prediction problem, where the result
of matching a concept description (state) is a set
of actions to be performed. For the system to be
truly adaptive, the system needs to learn incre-
mentally. Each new event is stored with the com-
puted action and the quality of the result. The
learning system can learn new rules that improve
the performance of the overall system. To guide
the learning system, there must be a well defined
notion of success or improvement so the learning
system can evaluate it previous performance.
As an example, machine learning can be used
to construct rules to assist in managing an assem-
bly line. In most complex assembly lines, subcom-
portents must be assembled before being added to
97
the final product. Determining when there exists a
shortage of parts of a subcomponent before it
impacts the main line is a difficult task. With
knowledge about part queue lengths and resulting
outcomes (gathered from past experiences or a
simulation of the assembly process), machine
learning systems can induce rules that can indicate
where future shortages may occur. These rules can
be given to a human production manager or ad-
ded to knowledge systems that control production.
4. Machine learning use in engineering in the
future
Before machine learning becomes a robust tool
that can be used in engineering for a wide range of
tasks, a number of areas need to be researched.
This section outlines those important issues for
future research. In many of these areas, research is
already underway; however, it will be some time
before results from the laboratory can be used to
construct tools for engineering.
4.1. Utilizing existing knowledge
A weak point of most current machine learning
systems is the lack of consideration for knowledge
available from sources in addition to the input
examples. Deductive learning does use outside
knowledge, but assumes that knowledge is com-
plete and correct. Learning systems need to take
advantage of the knowledge that engineers can
provide easily. Many LFE systems allow attributes
to be weighted, so that an engineer could specify
the attributes thought to be the most important or
that he would prefer be used in the synthesized
rules. As learning systems work on more complex
problems it is important that they be able to use
more complex forms of knowledge, such as rules
and scripts. Rules could help the system to con-
struct new attributes (see below) and realize when
it is suggesting inappropriate answers. Scripts
could help learning systems understand the se-
quence in which certain tasks occur, such as as-
sembling a class of parts.
Knowledge in engineering can come from a
variety of sources besides the engineer. Other
computer tools used by the engineer such as com-
puter-aided design (CAD) and finite element anal-
ysis (FEA) systems can provide useful knowledge.
 98 1 M S '91---Learning in I M S
Learning systems need to be able to tap into this
information and use it to construct rules that
consider all the complexities of engineering prob-
lems.
4.2. Learning in structural domains
Engineering problems involve complex struc-
tures that require rich representation, such as first
order predicate calculus. Propositional logic is not
adequate. Most machine learning systems deal
only, w i t h attribute/ value pairs. An
attribute/value representation cannot describe a
situation were one object is on top of, next to, or
inside of another object. Objects are treated as
whole entities with a uniform set of properties. In
order for machine learning to be useful for en-
gineering problems such as design and planning,
the systems must be able to work with structure.
Some work has been done in this area (e.g., [7,23]).
4. 3. Learning with continuous tJariables
Engineering problems require the use of con-
tinuous (real) numbers. Machine learning systems
(typically) deal only with discrete values. The
world might provide real quantities but some dis-
cretization always occurs over the values that are
actually used (measurements do not have infinite
precision). Dealing with large numbers of discrete
numbers is awkward and limiting (e.g., there is not
a value to indicate the average between two ad-
jacent discrete values). Some machine learning
systems have been modified to work with continu-
ous values [24], but at this time, there is not a well
defined approach for learning when some attri-
butes are real valued and others are nominal.
Engineering problems also deal with mathe-
matical formulas. There exist some discovery sys-
tems that can find mathematical formulas but
they cannot handle all the complexities of experi-
mental data. They do not handle noise and impre-
cision (inexact values). Learning from example
systems do not work with formulas at all. This
facility is important if they are to distinguish
between complete sets of data describable with
equations.
4.4. Constructiee / rneta learning
Considering abstractions of problems often
helps one to find a solution. This idea is ap-
~ ~mpulerr m lnduslrv
propriate for machine learning as well. 'Fhe most
informative method of distinguishing between a
set of events may not be the actual attribute
values provided. Constructl~,e mduc~+ion is the pro°
cess of adding higher-level attributes to the exam-
ples [25]. The higher-level descriptors can then be
used to construct the synthesized rules. The pro-
tess is constructive, because it iakes provided at-
tributes and combines them or applies known
operations to them in order to build the new
attributes. Such processes include logical connec-
tives between binary valued attributes and
mathematical operations with ,numeric attributes,
Future systems will be able to construct attributes
based upon knowledge provided bv engineers,
4.5, Integration o1 machine tearntn~ with existm~
engineering software
One of the most challenging aspects of making
machine learning useful to engineers is integrating
learning techniques with existing engineering
software. Getting learning systems to work with
database systems, C A D systems and FEA sys,
terns is a complex task. Learning systems need lo
use information from these systems, as described
earlier. However, learning systems need to provide
knowledge to these systems and assist the engineer
in making better use of such ~ystems. Learning
could help control the interface t~ such tools and
make them more flexible to accommodate individ-
ual work habits. Learning systems could learn
procedures for the tools and when they should be
applied. As an example, a learning system for an
FEA algorithm might learn when different types
of meshes should be automatically generated for
parts.
4.& Exploratory wstems
While simple discovery systems currently exis~
and are useful for some engineering problems,
future systems will be more powerful. With the
ability to use information provided by the en-
gineer, such systems could perform experiments
and explorations in the background. The results
can be presented to the engineer for future consid-
eration. Exploratory systems need to be integrated
with databases containing engineering informa-
tion. The systems can use the engineering knowl-
edge to discover important relationships and inter-
Computers in Industry B.L. Whitehall, S. C- E Lu / Machine learning in engineering automation
esting aspects of the data. Additionally, the infor-
mation can be used to guide experiments and to
complete partially solved problems.
5. Conclusion
Machine learning is useful in its current state to
help with many engineering problems. Learning
can be used to synthesis knowledge from complete
models and data. The synthesized knowledge as-
sists in the integration of models with other forms
of knowledge useful in engineering problem solv-
ing. Learning creates rules that can predict future
outcomes based upon past performances, an im-
portant type of classification.
In order for machine learning to become as
useful to engineers as the pocket calculator, learn-
ing systems must be able to handle all the data
types and knowledge engineers manipulate. The
systems must integrate with current systems used
by engineers for more beneficial results. To con-
struct competent machine assistants for engineers,
learning systems must be used to generalize an
engineer's actions and interface those actions with
the other engineering tools. Learning systems also
need to become more robust by determining which
machine learning technique is most appropriate
for a given problem and by performing deductive
reasoning when appropriate and inducing knowl-
edge when background knowledge is incomplete.
Acknowledgment
Funding for the research projects described in
this paper are provided by Allied Signal Aero-
space Company, Digital Equipment Corporation,
and National Science Foundation. The develop-
merit of the inductive/deductive decision-making
framework also benefits from general research
grants from Cray Research, Inc., Ford Motor
Company, and Xerox Corporation to our labora-
tory. These supports are greatly appreciated.
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