Nippon DEC is to distribute KBMS, an expert system development support tool developed by Nippon Telegraph & Telephone and marketed by NTT Software as part of a move to offer a full range of expert system development tools on VAX and MicroVAX computers: the offerings include artificial intelligence tools for database performance and fault diagnosis, integrated circuit design, and Computer-Aided Instruction; the KBMS software offers two modes of operation, an if… then rule mode, and a frame mode describing inter-knowledge relationships in a tree structure; it also has forward and backward inference mechanisms and costs about $65,000 on VAX 8000s, $40,000 on the MicroVAX II; Nip DEC is looking to sell 100 copies this year.
