A Mobile Application for Self-Guided Study of Formal Reasoning

VCLA hosted a talk by David Cerna

ABSTRACT

AXolotl is a self-study aid designed to guide students through the basics of formal reasoning and term manipulation. Unlike most of the existing study aids for formal reasoning, AXolotl is an Android-based application with a simple touch-based interface. Part of the design goal was to minimize the possibility of user errors which distract from the learning process, such as typos or inconsistent application of the provided rules. The system includes a zoomable proof viewer which displays the progress made so far and allows for storage of the completed proofs as a JPEG or LATEX file. The software comes with a small library of problems and additionally one may write AXolotl problem files using a simple input language. The current input language supports problems which can be solved using rules which transform a single expression into a set of expressions. This covers educational scenarios found in our first semester introduction to logic course and helps bridge the gap between propositional and first-order reasoning. 

Avatar of David Cerna, JKU Linz based on his AXolotl mobile application