Theory Solving made easy with Clingo 5 ( Extended Version ∗ )

Answer Set Programming (ASP) is a model, ground, and solve paradigm. The integration of applicationor theory-specific reasoning into ASP systems thus impacts on many if not all elements of its workflow, viz. input language, grounding, intermediate language, solving, and output format. We address this challenge with the fifth generation of the ASP system clingo and its grounding and solving components by equipping them with well-defined generic interfaces facilitating the manifold integration efforts. On the grounder’s side, we introduce a generic way of specifying language extensions and propose an intermediate format accommodating their ground representation. At the solver end, this is accompanied by high-level interfaces easing the integration of theory propagators dealing with these extensions.