Strong equivalence of logic programs with abstract constraint atoms

Abstract

Logic programs with abstract constraint atoms provide a unifying framework for studying logic programs with various kinds of constraints. Establishing strong equivalence between logic programs is a key property for program maintenance and optimization, and for guaranteeing the same behavior for a revised original program in any context. In this paper, we study strong equivalence of logic programs with abstract constraint atoms. We first give a general characterization of strong equivalence based on a new definition of program reduct for logic programs with abstract constraints. Then we consider a particular kind of program revision-constraint replacements addressing the question: under what conditions can a constraint in a program be replaced by other constraints, so that the resulting program is strongly equivalent to the original one. © 2011 Springer-Verlag Berlin Heidelberg.