A Translational Approach to Constraint Answer Set Solving

TL;DR

This paper introduces a novel method combining Constraint Processing with Answer Set Programming to efficiently solve Constraint Satisfaction Problems, demonstrating improved computational performance through logical encodings.

Contribution

It presents a new approach that integrates constraint techniques into ASP, enabling effective solving of finite domain constraints with logical decompositions.

Findings

Constraints can be decomposed into logic programs achieving various consistencies.

Experiments show significant computational improvements.

The approach effectively solves CSPs within ASP frameworks.

Abstract

We present a new approach to enhancing Answer Set Programming (ASP) with Constraint Processing techniques which allows for solving interesting Constraint Satisfaction Problems in ASP. We show how constraints on finite domains can be decomposed into logic programs such that unit-propagation achieves arc, bound or range consistency. Experiments with our encodings demonstrate their computational impact.