Conjunctive Query Programming: A Paradigm for Knowledge Engineering of Optimization Problems in the Semantic Web

This paper explores the idea of integrating powerful optimization and planning techniques with knowledge representation formalisms of the Semantic Web. The paper outlines a language paradigm that combines algebraic and logical modelling of constraints and objective functions. It provides a method for instantiation of optimization and planning problems with Semantic Web background knowledge, by modelling objective functions and restrictions as algebraic and logic expressions of results of conjunctive queries. Furthermore, the paper investigates reasoning techniques for the language based on problem compilation to satisfiability modulo theories and integer programming.