A BRIEF DESCRIPTION  OF MOTEL 
-----------------------------

MOTEL is alogic-based knowledge representation languages of the KL-ONE
family.  It contains as a kernel the ALC language which is a decidable
sublanguage of first-order predicate logic.

Whereas ALC is a  single-agent knowledge representation language, i.e.
ALC is only able to represent general world knowledge or the knowledge
of one  agent  about the  world,  MOTEL  is a   multi-agent  knowledge
representation  system. The MOTEL  language  allows modal contexts and
modal concept forming  operators which allow  to represent  and reason
about the  believes and wishes of  multiple  agents. Furthermore it is
possible to represent defaults and stereotypes.

Beside   the  basic   resoning facilities   for  consistency checking,
classification, and realization, MOTEL provides an abductive inference
mechanism.   Furthermore it  is able  to   give  explanations for  its
inferences.

Keywords: Knowledge representation, Modal Logic, Stereotypes, 
          Default Reasoning, Abduction.

Address: Ullrich Hustadt                       
         Max-Planck-Institut f"ur Informatik         
         Geb"aude 44, Im Stadtwald             
         66123 Saarbr"ucken, Germany             

         e-mail: Ullrich.Hustadt@mpi-sb.mpg.de
         voice:  +49 681 302 5431
         fax:    +49 681 302 5401

The latest version of MOTEL can be received by anonymous ftp from
mpi-sb.mpg.de (139.19.1.1):/pub/tools/motel.tar.Z

This compressed tar-file contains the MOTEL  sources (one PROLOG file)
and the user manual (one  dvi file). If you  have any problems getting
the system  or any questions concerning  MOTEL you can send  an e-mail
message to the address given above.

To run MOTEL, you need one of the following PROLOG systems:
- SWI-Prolog (Version 1.6.17 June 1993)
- Quintus Prolog Release 3.1.1 
- SICStus 2.1