We introduce a parallel offline algorithm for computing hybrid conditional plans, called HCP-ASP, oriented towards robotics applications. HCP-ASP relies on modeling actuation actions and sensing actions in an expressive nonmonotonic language of answer set programming (ASP), and computation of the branches of a conditional plan in parallel using an ASP solver. In particular, thanks to external atoms, continuous feasibility checks (like collision checks) are embedded into formal representations of actuation actions and sensing actions in ASP; and thus each branch of a hybrid conditional plan describes a feasible execution of actions to reach their goals. Utilizing nonmonotonic constructs and nondeterministic choices, partial knowledge about states and nondeterministic effects of sensing actions can be explicitly formalized in ASP; and thus each branch of a conditional plan can be computed by an ASP solver without necessitating a conformant planner and an ordering of sensing actions in advance. We apply our method in a service robotics domain and report experimental evaluations. Furthermore, we present performance comparisons with other compilation based conditional planners on standardized benchmark domains.

A very desirable Datalog extension investigated by many researchers in the last 30 years consists in allowing the use of the basic SQL aggregates min, max, count and sum in recursive rules. In this paper, we propose a simple comprehensive solution that extends the declarative least-fixpoint semantics of Horn Clauses, along with the optimization techniques used in the bottom-up implementation approach adopted by many Datalog systems. We start by identifying a large class of programs of great practical interest in which the use of min or max in recursive rules does not compromise the declarative fixpoint semantics of the programs using those rules. Then, we revisit the monotonic versions of count and sum aggregates proposed by Mazuran et al. (2013b, The VLDB Journal 22, 4, 471–493) and named, respectively, mcount and msum. Since mcount, and also msum on positive numbers, are monotonic in the lattice of set-containment, they preserve the fixpoint semantics of Horn Clauses. However, in many applications of practical interest, their use can lead to inefficiencies, that can be eliminated by combining them with max, whereby mcount and msum become the standard count and sum. Therefore, the semantics and optimization techniques of Datalog are extended to recursive programs with min, max, count and sum, making possible the advanced applications of superior performance and scalability demonstrated by BigDatalog (Shkapsky et al. 2016. In SIGMOD. ACM, 1135–1149) and Datalog-MC (Yang et al. 2017. The VLDB Journal 26, 2, 229–248).