Tom Schrijvers, K.U. Leuven, Belgium
Academic research in Logic Programming goes back at least as far as the early
1970s — that is already more than 35 years. During most of that time, ICLP has
been the premier venue for presenting academic research. At the same time,
Logic Programming is being used widely in industry. However, it has enjoyed a
lot less visibility there, and until now it has lacked a designated forum that
brings together industrial practitioners and researchers.
The goal of this Commercial Users of Logic Programming (CULP) workshop is to
put the commercial and practical use (and users) of Logic Programming in the
spotlight. It aims at providing professionals with an opportunity to share
their experience, and to enable contacts with other commercial users and
academics.
The 1st CULP workshop took place on July 16 2009 in the Pasadena convention
center, at the occasion of the 26th International Conference on Logic
Programming.
The workshop featured seven commercial speakers active in diverse areas, from
financial markets to government agencies. They build both on existing logic
programming systems, and on research papers and ideas for developing their own
systems. Most notable is the scale of the problems dealt with on a daily basis,
many orders of magnitude greater than anticipated by researchers. What is the
secret of Logic Programming’s success in industry? In three words: better, cheaper, faster.
That is: better in managing complexity and providing advanced features, and
cheaper and much faster in development.
Also part of the programme was an open discussion on the concerns of commercial
users of logic programming, such as attracting new employees and improving
visibility within the wider logic programming community. This discussion has
led to the CULP Google group: http://groups.google.co.uk/group/cu-lp
Off-stage, the workshop has also contributed to mutual contacts between
commercial users, paired with much sharing of experiences and business cards,
as well as with researchers, providing new challenges for systems developments
and research.
The workshop would not have been possible without the help of many people: the
seven speakers that made up the programme, the ICLP 2009 organizers for hosting
our workshop, and all the people that made us aware of potential speakers and
potential speakers aware of CULP. Special thanks go to Manuel Carro, the ICLP
2009 workshop chair, for encouraging and supporting the organization of this
workshop.
I hope to see you all again next year in Edinburgh for the second edition of
CULP, at the occasion of the Federated Logic Conferences (FLOC 2010). In the
mean time, you are all welcome to join the CULP Google group.