ISAC, a transparent system for applied mathematics

The ISAC-project is a research and development project at the Institute for Software Technology of the Graz University of Technology. The ISAC-system establishes new base-technology for a novel kind of interactive and web-based transparent software for applied mathematics. The novelty is given by the human-readable knowledge base including Isabelles HOL-theories and by the transparently working knowledge interpreter (a generalization of 'single stepping' algebra systems). Research within the ISAC-project goes alongside the development of the ISAC-system and concerns issues, which reach from technological ones like 'math on the (semantic) web' down to foundamental ones like a 'rigorous formal semantics of tools for applied mathematcs'. The background to both, development and research, is given by actual needs in math education as well as by foundamental questions about 'the mechanization of thinking' as an essential aspect in mathematics and in technology. The ISAC-system under construction comprises a tutoring-system and an authoring-system. The latter provides for adaption to various needs of individual users and educational institutions and for extensions to arbitrary fields of applied mathematics.