Newsgroups: rec.arts.int-fiction
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From: goetz@cs.buffalo.edu (Phil Goetz)
Subject: Re: Case based Int-Fiction parsers
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Date: Mon, 15 Nov 1993 23:00:30 GMT
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In article <2c6igf$a31@mojo.eng.umd.edu> peugh@glue.umd.edu (David D. Peugh) writes:
>
>I was curious as to whether anyone has created an adventure
>game parser that is based on Case theory?
>
>It seems natural to define a Verb and then put in slots with the
>verb to handle nouns with Nominative case, Accusative, Locative,
>Insturmental, and whatever other types of cases that might arise.

I think all adventure parsers are written this way.
Certain the Scott Adams "verb object" parser is case-based!

My accursed adventure Inmate, which I will mention yet again,
is case-based.  The cases you find you want to use in an adventure
are different than the cases English profs use.
Inmate takes 3 kinds of sentences:

Type					Example
intrans_verb				n, jump
locative_verb prep_dest dest [prep_instr instr]		go in the car
transitive_verb object [prep_dest dest] [prep_instr instr]	get bucket,
	put three yellow marbles from the orange bucket into the box
	on the dresser with the big froodaddle

Note that the "from the orange bucket" clause is part of the object
"three yellow marbles from the orange bucket", which is all parsed
as 1 noun phrase.  Similarly "the box on the dresser" is 1 noun phrase
parsed as the destination.

A word may be a member of all three verb classes, e.g. "jump"
is both intransitive ("jump") and locative ("jump onto the car"),
so the parser needs to be able to backtrack if it trys parsing the
sentence as one with an intransitive verb and finds it can't.

Phil
goetz@cs.buffalo.edu
