How to develop an expert system

I am developing an expert system for a homework project. It is not a serious project, just a warm up :)

1.) download esb4 from http://www.esbuilder.com/esb4.zip (freeware) and set up.
2.) download javaESB v1 from http://www.esbuilder.com/JavaESB-v1.zip (freeware, but v2 is commercial)

esb4 includes a question editor, a knowledge acquisition and a user interface module. ( http://www.esbuilder.com/standard_esb.htm )

javaESB v1 is for web deployment, it uses the question files produced with esb4 through an applet. ( http://www.esbuilder.com/internet_esb.htm )

I hope to develop a decision supporting system about my domain, balistics.. The system will ask the user some questions about the domain and direct him/her according to the answers.


3.) Developing the program ->
- Enter the questions to the system with the ESB Question Editor. Assign importance of the questions and specify their dependency with each other. Save the .qst file which includes the questions. The interface is user friendly.

- Populate the knowledge base with ESB Knowledge Acquisition. This is accomplished by adding records to the system. At the end of a path of question, add the result. It may be an html file etc. When the user answers questions, it will get the most matching results (records saved with this program). Save the .dat file which includes the records.

- Examine the program with ESB User Interface. This is what the end user sees, a simulation of the program.

4.) JavaESB Instructions.doc document under JavaESB-v1 (downloaded at step 2) explains how to use the given applet. The document is pretty clear. Give the.qst and .dat files (prepared in the previous step )as QFile and DatFile parameters to the applet. Unfortunately the addon applet depends on crashed :( So, i tested my system with ESB User Interface module..