Box constraint collections for adhoc constraints

Abstract

In this paper, we propose a new language-independent representation of adhoc constraints, called a box constraint collection. Using constructive disjunction, this representation achieves domain consistency. We develop an algorithm to automatically generate a box constraint collection for a given adhoc constraint. The result is guaranteed to be complete and correct, and achieve domain consistency. The constructive disjunction propagator for the box constraint collection can be efficiently implemented using indexicals. We give correctness and completeness result for our compilation scheme, and outline optimization techniques. Experiments show that our representation is simple, compact, and propagates efficiently. © Springer-Verlag 2003.