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cbcl.pro[e84,jmc]	Proposal for starting work on CBCL

	Some years ago I wrote a paper about what I called a
``Common Business Communication Language''.  It would be a language
in which a computer belonging to one organization would communicate
to a computer belonging to another about business matters.  For
example, it should be able to say

``Can you ship 10000 No. 3 pencils to us by November 7?  What is
your price?  If it's less than $200, we hereby order them.''

	At first I thought this would be just a grubby standardization
project, but actually it turned out to require formalizing an interesting
fragment of the semantics of natural language.  The details ---
such as are known --- are in the paper, which I will send you.
A SCRIBE source is on-line at SU-AI as CBCL[F75,JMC] and can be
FTPed without password.
The idea has received a favorable reception, but like several of
my ideas, it is a bit off the beaten track, because of its emphasis
on semantics to the total irrelevance of natural language syntax.
Anyway I didn't find anyone interested in working on it until just
now.

	Anne Gardner just received a PhD from the Stanford Computer
Science Department with a nice thesis on the computer understanding
of legal issues.  (She already had a law degree).  She
approached me about working on CBCL, and I think she is eminently
qualified.  Therefore, I would like to start a small project with
her as a Research Associate.  Your maximum grant, which I understand
from Jeff Ullman is $40K, would pay her a salary (not yet determined)
for the better part of a year and a bit of computer time.  In the
meantime I could seek other funding.

	The work would consist mainly of formalizing a fragment of
CBCL sufficient for communication about some selected area in which
computers might communicate commercially.  A possible example is that
a parts-explosion program might communicate with computers belonging
to suppliers in order to determine what price and delivery could
be quoted on a product using these parts.  Our project would work
on the protocols rather than do a program.

	I understand that letter proposals should be in next week.
However, I will be in France, so she, GARDNER@SUMEX, would have
to answer questions.  I will be back on the 24th.

	Is this appropriate for one of the Bell Labs grants?