KWTR: ontology versioning
From semanticweb.org
[edit] Contributors:
Max Völkel
Vit Novacek DERI Galway
- What is the state of the art of Semantic Web in your research field?
- Version management implemented in several projects, however, there are no overall methodological and/or theoretical frameworks that would support the implementations. These are rather ad hoc in line with the following four basic approaches to ontology versioning that can be identified in practice:
- Purely Syntactic Versioning - similar to software version maintenance, relatively easy to implement, however, everything done only at the syntax level -- no semantics of the change captured
- Transaction-based Versioning - inspired by the database theory, namely solutions supporting schema evolution, handle changes without loss of existing data, using mechanism of transactions
- Merge-based versioning - application of a more universal approach to the versioning problem, existing (semi-automatic) ontology merging technology allows for induction of diff between two or more ontologies
- Semantic Extensions of the Syntactic Versioning - not only syntactic diff, but also a semantic one is taken into account, implementation depends on the semantics representation used (pure RDF, RDF/S, OWL, F-logic, etc.), diff computed on deductive closures of the versioned ontologies
- Provide references and short abstracts of three papers you consider as significant in your research field.
- Michel Klein, Dieter Fensel. Ontology versioning on the Semantic Web. In Proceedings of the International Semantic Web Working Symposium (SWWS). Stanford University, 2001. [CiteSeer]
- Natalya F. Noy, Stanford University, Mark A. Musen, Stanford University, Ontology Versioning in an Ontology Management Framework, 2004 DOI
- L Stojanovic, Methods and Tools for Ontology Evolution (phd thesis), 2004. [PDF]
- Please provide one or more examples (either business, or research, or both) in which semantic web has been used (if you can, add some references).
- The [MarcOnt project] uses SemVersion (syntactic and partially also semantic versioning).
- The KAON link research framework and LinkFactory link industrial toolbox implement transaction-based versioning.
- The PROMPT and PROMPTDiff link research prototypes implement the merge-based versioning.
- Are there existing tools or demos? Please indicate some of them.
- What are the open problems in your Semantic Web research field? Why?
- The exact requirements for versioning are still unclear. Most projects articulate a vague need for versioning by there is to date no clear list of use cases for semantic versioning.
- Semantic versioning (perhaps the most promising and theoretically 'sound' approach to Semantic Web ontology versioning) has not been studied sufficiently.
- Connection of versioning with issues like consistency identification, resolution and version-aware inference in general should be properly investigated.
- Provide references and links of the most relevant Semantic Web research projects in your field.
- What challenges try these projects to overcome?
- Methodology of versioning, clasification of basic approaches - formal background
- Methodology and implementation of dynamic ontology lifecycle and the respective ontology maintenance prototype - incorporation of versioning and (learned) ontology integration into the lifecycle tailored for application to data-intensive and dynamic scenarios
- Dynamics of networked (distributed) ontologies.
- What are their foreseen benefits (both in market and scientific community)?
- more efficient and dynamics-aware knowledge management supported by:
- well-founded and "safe" methodologies and mechanisms of change implementation in a knowledge base
- tools for maintenance of ontology versions in time
- techniques for visualisation of the relations between several versions of an ontology
- more efficient and dynamics-aware knowledge management supported by:
- When, in your opinion, will projects’ results be ready for industry?
- 2-5 years
- Do you think that it is important to invest (money and time) in these topics? Why?
- More than important - means for efficient and reasonable change maintenance are crucial for application of the cutting-edge knowledge engineering technologies in practical scenarios, that are very often inherently dynamic (see also the more general topic KWTR: ontology maintenance).
- What are, in your opinion, the most relevant Semantic Web challenges that will be solved in the long term (10 years)? Why?
- dynamic ontology integration and population (needed to support day-to-day dynamics in realistic application scenarios)
- combination of version management with inference and safe change implementation and propagation in ontologies (the changes are not only managed, but also assessed in the context of the current content of the versioned ontology, which is needed for improved usability of the changing ontologies)
