06-25433 – Logic Programming

Writing and running

simple Prolog programs
This lecture will cover writing and
querying facts without and with unbound
variables, and show how rules are a way of
querying more than one fact at a time.
 06-25433 – Logic Programming

A question from last week

Why can’t Prolog have the ++ operator, for instance:
A_Variable++

Answer:
A_Variable ++
is the equivalent of:
A_Variable is A_Variable + 1

Prolog doesn’t allow variables to be reassigned.

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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

Last time ...

Prolog’s built-in predicates and user-defined
predicates look the same and behave the same.

Every predicate in Prolog returns true (yes) or fail

(no).

Variables can’t be reassigned - it’s not logical.

Var is Var +1
is as logical as saying:
1 is 1 + 1.

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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

Last time ...

For your rules to communicate with other rules, you
have to:
– send information in through the parameter list;
– send information back out through the parameter
list.

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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

Last time ...

When there is a choice of rules,
– Prolog tries the first and, if it works, returns
“true” and carries on

If the rule fails,

– it tries the next, and the next and the next, etc,
until:
– either it finds a true rule or it fails
(catastrophically)

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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

Today
This lecture will cover:
– revise unification
– introduce facts
– show that Prolog uses unification when searching
for clauses
– writing rules that use facts
– how Prolog works – its “hidden” data structure

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Unification revisited - 1
Tutorial Sheet 1 had a number of matching and
unification questions.

Prolog has several predicates that match or compare

two terms:
==/2 e.g. 1 == 1
\==/2 e.g. 1 \== 2
=:=/2 e.g. 5 =:= 2 + 3
=\=/2 e.g. 7 =\= 16 / 2
>=/2 e.g. 5 >= 3
etc
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Unification revisited - 2
None of these predicates assigns values to a variable:
==/2, \==/2,=:=/2, =\=/2, >=/2, etc

Only two predicates assign values:

Arithmetic only:
is/2 e.g. Var1 is 3 * 4

Unification:
=/2 e.g. Var2 = an_atom

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Unification revisited - 3
When is unification true?

Unifying a variable with a literal:

Var1 = an_atom.
Var2 = 300.045.
Var3 = an_object(an_atom, 300.045).

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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

Unification revisited - 3
When is unification true?

Unifying a variable with a literal:

an_atom = Var1.
300.045 = Var2.
an_object(an_atom, 300.045) = Var3.

The “empty” variable does not

have to be on the left-hand
side.

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Unification revisited - 4
When is unification true?

Unifying a variable with another variable:

| ?- Var1 = Var2.
Var2 = Var1 ? ;
no
The “semi-colon” in
Prolog show theProlog
Tvariable binding
means “or”.
– the “contents”We’re
of thesaying
variable
“Or is there
All unification really does another solution...?”
is to make variables share
memory locations.
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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

Unification revisited - 4
We can run a conjunction of unifications:

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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

Writing facts - 1
In the last lecture, we saw rules such as:

display_balance(bank_account(No, Name,
Balance)) :-
write(Name),
write(' account no: '),
write(No),
nl,
write('Your balance is: '),
write(Balance),
nl.
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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

Writing facts - 2
Facts are rules without a body:

likes(max, julia).
likes(max, amabel).

They are always true, so we could also write them

as:
likes(max, julia) :-
true.
likes(max, amabel) :-
true.

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Queries with these facts

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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

What facts represent

Facts with arguments are used to describe
relationships between arguments.
e.g.
lives_in(max, london).
likes(max, amabel).
child(charles, amy, brian).
price(template, 3, 4.75).
assembly(arm, joint(ball,3)).

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An insight
Prolog matches our query with facts using
unification.

Prolog uses unification wherever it has to match

anything with anything.

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Consolidation moment

Facts are rules that are always true.

Prolog will attempt to return every solution – in the

order that they occur in the program.

Prolog uses unification to match queries with rule

heads and facts.

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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

Jealousy: the jealous/2 rule

This is a simple program:

jealous(Jealous, Victim) :-
likes(Person, Jealous),
likes(Person, Victim).

likes(max, julia).
likes(max, amabel).

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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

Jealousy: the jealous/2 rule

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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

States of the stack - 1

Step 1 - add to stack
jealous(julia, Victim) :-
likes(Person, julia),
likes(Person, Victim).

Step 2 - match first subgoal

jealous(julia, Victim) :-
likes(max, julia),
likes(max, Victim).

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States of the stack - 2

Step 3 - match second subgoal
jealous(julia, julia) :-
likes(max, julia),
likes(max, julia).

jealous(julia, amabel) :-
likes(max, julia),
likes(max, amabel).

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States of the stack - 3

Step 4 - report success to the user
| ?- jealous(julia, Who).
Who = julia ;

jealous(julia, amabel) :-
likes(max, julia),
likes(max, amabel).

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States of the stack - 4

Step 5 - report success to the user

| ?- jealous(julia, Who).
Who = julia ;
Who = amabel ;

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States of the stack - 5

Step 6 - report no more solutions

| ?- jealous(julia, Who).
Who = julia ;
Who = amabel ;
no

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Consolidation moment

Prolog will attempt to find all solutions – if you ask.

Finding multiple solutions is based on an internal

stack – which you’ll never see but you’ll see the
effects.

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Some terminology

jealous(Jealous, Victim) :-
likes(Person, Jealous),
likes(Person, Victim).

likes(max, julia). 1 procedure

likes(max, amabel).

1 procedure

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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

Some terminology

jealous(Jealous, Victim) :-
likes(Person, Jealous),
likes(Person, Victim).
1 clause
likes(max, julia).
likes(max, amabel).

2 clauses

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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

Some terminology

jealous(Jealous, Victim) :-
likes(Person, Jealous),
likes(Person, Victim).
1 rule
likes(max, julia).
likes(max, amabel).

2 facts

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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

Friendship - 1

Suppose we define our friend as being either:

an immediate friend of ourselves

or
a friend of a friend

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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

Friendship - 2
We could code this as:
friend_of(max, julia).
friend_of(max, amabel).
friend_of(amabel, richard). % etc
% 1
friend(Pers, Friend) :-
friend_of(Pers, Friend).
% 2
friend(Pers, Friend) :-
friend_of(Pers, Inter),
friend_of(Inter, Friend).
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 06-25433 – Logic Programming

A question

How many subgoals would the longest friend/2 rule

have to have?

or, to put it another way:

What is the maximum number of friends you could

have?

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