Rational Logic Programming Debugging

Information about Prolog data term's dependencies on derivation goals can be used for improved debugging, whether in the wrong solution or the missing solution type of faulty program behaviour. A debugger for full Prolog (itself written in Prolog) has been developed which automates the reasoning ability required to pinpoint errors, resorting to the user only to ask about the intended program semantics. The debugger makes cooperative use of both the declarative and the operational semantics of Prolog programs. The approach could be used for logic programming and theorem proving in general, and could be particularly important when adapted to distributed systems, where it is hard to use traditional sequential debugging tools. In this writing the debugging algorithm is expressed in detail, session protocols are exhibited, comparison to other work is made, but the implementation is not examined. The relationship of debugging to fault nding and explanation giving is brought to light within this approach. This work is augments on Pereira 86].