On Finding a Solution in Temporal Constraint Satisfaction Problems

Computing a consistent interpretation of the variables involved in a set of temporal constraints is an important task for many areas of AI requiring temporal reasoning. We focus on the important classes of the qualitative relations in Nebel and Biirckert's ORD-Horn algebra, and of the metric constraints forming a STP, possibly augmented w i th inequations. For these tractable classes we present three new algorithms for solving the problem of finding a solution, and an efficient algorithm for determining the consistency of a STP augmented with in equations.