AI Planning: Systems and Techniques

A longstanding problem in the field of automated reasoning is designing systems that can describe a set of actions (or a plan) that can be expected to allow the system to reach a desired goal. Ideally, this set of actions is then passed to a robot, a manufacturing system, or some other form of effector, which can follow the plan and produce the desired result. The design of such planners has been with AI since its earliest days, and a large number of techniques have been introduced in progressively more ambitious systems over a long period. In addition, planning research has introduced many problems to the field of AI. Some examples are the representation and the reasoning about time, causality, and intentions; physical or other constraints on suitable solutions; uncertainty in the execution of plans; sensation and perception of the real world and the holding of beliefs about it; and multiple agents who might cooperate or interfere.