Support for problem formulation and evaluation in manpower planning problems

We are developing a system to support a manpower planner in the decision making process. The functional structure of this system consists of two main components. One component, the problem solver, generates the consequences during the planning period of specified problem situations. The other component, the problem interpreter, is responsible for the communication of the planner with the system. In this paper we focus on this last component. The problem interpreter must support a planner in a rather active way in the formulation of the problem situations and in the evaluation of their consequences, generated by the system. So, from the actions that take place in the communication of the planner with the system, we come to a set of tasks that must be provided by the problem interpreter.