OASIS Symposium at ISWC 2011

1. Motivation Standard Example Roadmap
Ontology Integration and Interoperability
(OntoIOp) – Part 1: The Distributed Ontology
Language (DOL)
OASIS Symposium @ ISWC 2011
Till Mossakowski, Oliver Kutz, Christoph Lange
Universität Bremen, Germany
2011-10-24
Mossakowski/Kutz/Lange (OASIS; U. Bremen) OntoIOP Part 1: Distributed Ontology Language (DOL) 2011-10-24 1

2. Motivation Standard Example Roadmap
Interoperable Assistive Technology
Assistive technology increasingly relies on communication
among users,
between users and their devices, and
among these devices.
Making such ICT accessible and inclusive is costly or even
impossible
We aim at more interoperable
devices,
services accessing these devices, and
content delivered by these services
. . . at the levels of
data and metadata
data models and data modelling methods
metamodels as well as a meta ontology language
Mossakowski/Kutz/Lange (OASIS; U. Bremen) OntoIOP Part 1: Distributed Ontology Language (DOL) 2011-10-24 2

3. Motivation Standard Example Roadmap
The Big Picture of Interoperability
Knowledge Infrastructure Service-Oriented Smart Environment
Architecture
Concepts/Data/Individuals Service Target (Device)
Device
rabil r
ity
fo
Ontology Service Description Target Description
inte ppings
rope
ma
Ontology Language/Logic Service Descr. Language Target Descr. Language
Data Concepts/Data/Individuals processes Service accesses Target (Device)
Device
represented in terms of satisfies conforms to
Models Ontology refers to Service Description Target Description
written in written in written in
Metamodels Ontology Language/Logic Service Descr. Language Target Descr. Language
Knowledge Software Agents Hardware
For now we focus
on the “content”/
“knowledge”
column
Mossakowski/Kutz/Lange (OASIS; U. Bremen) OntoIOP Part 1: Distributed Ontology Language (DOL) 2011-10-24 3

4. Motivation Standard Example Roadmap
DOL (Distributed Ontology Language)
In practical applications, one ontology language and one
logic doesn’t suffice to achieve semantic integration and
interoperability
Part 1 of the OntoIOp standard provides a meta-language
(DOL) for:
logically heterogeneous ontologies
modular ontologies
formal and informal links between ontologies/modules
annotation and documentation of ontologies
DOL will have a formal semantics and concrete XML, RDF and
text serializations
We leave services and devices to future parts of the standard
Mossakowski/Kutz/Lange (OASIS; U. Bremen) OntoIOP Part 1: Distributed Ontology Language (DOL) 2011-10-24 4

5. Motivation Standard Example Roadmap
Why a Standard?
DOL is now being developed
as ISO Working Item 17347
within ISO TC 37 (Terminology and other language and content
resources) / SC 3 (Systems to manage terminology, knowledge
and content)
by a project team (= us) and experts from ≈ 15 countries
In practice, interoperability can only be achieved via standards
(cf. Christian Galinski @ OASIS 2009)
formulate consensual rules under participation of major
stakeholders (here: ontology language communities)
improve suitability of products, processes and services
facilitate communication
reduce complexity (and thus costs)
increase quality via certification
Mossakowski/Kutz/Lange (OASIS; U. Bremen) OntoIOP Part 1: Distributed Ontology Language (DOL) 2011-10-24 5

6. Motivation Standard Example Roadmap
Requirements I
DOL should be generally applicable, open, and extensible
DOL shall be a logic-agnostic metalanguage
DOL should have user- and machine-readable serializations
DOL should have a well-defined formal, logic-based
semantics
Mossakowski/Kutz/Lange (OASIS; U. Bremen) OntoIOP Part 1: Distributed Ontology Language (DOL) 2011-10-24 6

7. Motivation Standard Example Roadmap
The Onto-Logical Translation Graph
OBOOWL
OBO 1.4
bRDF
EL QL RL RDF
PL
OWL RDFS
DDLOWL
RDFSOWL grey: no fixed expressivity
green: decidable ontology languages
yellow: semi-decidable
ECoOWL
FOL=
orange: some second-order constructs
red: full second-order logic
CL ECoFOL Rel-S
F-logic
subinstitution
CASL theoroidal subinstitution
simultaneously exact and
FOLms= model-expansive comorphisms
HOL
model-expansive comorphisms
Mossakowski/Kutz/Lange (OASIS; U. Bremen) OntoIOP Part 1: Distributed Ontology Language (DOL) 2011-10-24 7

8. Motivation Standard Example Roadmap
Requirements II
DOL should allow for expressing logically heterogeneous
ontologies (and literal reuse of existing modules)
DOL should allow for expressing links between ontologies
DOL
Common Common
OWL Logic Logic
ontology ontology
language interpretation
translation
import import
DOL DOL
OWL-XML CLIF
ASK-IT Ontologies: DOLCE
• Transportation Foundational
• Tourism Ontology
• Personal Support
Mossakowski/Kutz/Lange (OASIS; U. Bremen) OntoIOP Part 1: Distributed Ontology Language (DOL) 2011-10-24 8

9. Motivation Standard Example Roadmap
Requirements III
DOL should allow for writing down ontologies and ontology
links as implicitly as possible and as explicitly as needed
DOL should allow for rich annotation and documentation of
ontologies
Mossakowski/Kutz/Lange (OASIS; U. Bremen) OntoIOP Part 1: Distributed Ontology Language (DOL) 2011-10-24 9

10. Motivation Standard Example Roadmap
Conformance Criteria
DOL should work with any existing or future ontology
language (if the latter conforms!)
We shall establish the conformance of OWL, Common Logic,
RDFS, F-logic, UML class diagrams, and OBO
Conformance of a logic (directly or by translation):
semantic conformance > entailment conformance
Conformance of a serialization:
XML conformance > RDF conformance > text conformance >
standoff markup conformance
Conformance of a document
(“Is this document a DOL ontology?”)
Conformance of an application:
A DOL-conforming application produces DOL-conforming
documents!
Mossakowski/Kutz/Lange (OASIS; U. Bremen) OntoIOP Part 1: Distributed Ontology Language (DOL) 2011-10-24 10

11. Motivation Standard Example Roadmap
Example: A Heterogeneous Time Ontology
logic OWL logic CommonLogic
spec TimeOWL = spec TimeCL = TimeRIF then
Class: TemporalEntity . (forall (t1 t2)
ObjectProperty: before (or (before t1 t2)
Domain: TemporalEntity (before t2 t1)
Range: TemporalEntity (= t1 t2)))
Characteristics: Transitive end
end
Existing and future DOL features relevant here:
logic RIF literal inclusion of existing languages
spec TimeRIF = TimeOWL then
Group ( modular reuse
Forall ?t1 ?t2 ?t3 XML and RDF serializations
(before(?t1 ?t3) :-
further link types
before(?t1 ?t2)
before(?t2 ?t3)) documenting translations explicitly
end
rich annotations and documentation
Mossakowski/Kutz/Lange (OASIS; U. Bremen) OntoIOP Part 1: Distributed Ontology Language (DOL) 2011-10-24 11

12. Motivation Standard Example Roadmap
Roadmap
Current development is done via mailing list and file repository.
Later, we will more and more follow the formal ISO procedures.
Now (Oct–Dec 2011): WD (Working Draft) in preparation of the
CD (Committee Draft) ballot
from Dec 2011: experts review and prepare formal vote on CD;
discussions at meetings in Feb 2012 and Jun 2012
Aug 2013: DIS (Draft International Standard)
Feb 2015: FDIS (Final Draft International Standard)
Aug 2015: IS (International Standard)
http://ontolog.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?OntoIOp
Mossakowski/Kutz/Lange (OASIS; U. Bremen) OntoIOP Part 1: Distributed Ontology Language (DOL) 2011-10-24 12