Happy New Years! (01)
I tried doing a websearch for the ISO Technical Report TR9007 and
could not find a copy that a poor
student could read. All I found was a page that claimed its Price was
$206.00, and a full MBR Price of $164.80
with a File Size: 12 MB (02)
It is not useful to me to spend that kind of money on a slab of dead
tree paper that still has to be understood and processed by me before
implementation as a program, if it is even possible. (03)
Perhaps we should advance ontologies as a publishing medium, much like
a magazine, or a paperback. When stuff is published as an ontology,
it has the added benefit that the knowledge in the ontology is
available for use by your computer to enhance its processing
capability, and ability to "understand" the world better. (04)
JK (05)
On Tue, Jan 4, 2011 at 11:40 AM, Sjir Nijssen <sjir.nijssen@xxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
>
> Ed Barkmeyer wrote:
>
>
>
> Yes! We have to show them what we can do with ontologies, per se, because
>people have also been doing knowledge engineering in the development of
>software (/hardware) systems for 50 years. One version of the sales pitch is
>that ontologies are the next generation data/information models -- they focus
>on the domain concepts and their relationships and not the software renditions
>of them. But that alone generates shelfware. We must show what we can do with
>these models that cannot be done with data/information models (and the
>database schemas and OOPL classes generated from them). Otherwise we have
>achieved formally grounded information models, full stop -- an academic
>nirvana with no demonstrated value to the people who pay for model and
>software development.
>
> I agree with Ed that the ontology community should be invited to show what
>cannot be done with a Conceptual Schema and an associated fact base that can
>be done with an OWL expressed ontology.
>
>
>
> A few facts and questions are probably worth mentioning
>
>
>
> 1. ISO Technical Report TR9007 (1987) “Concepts and Terminology for the
>Conceptual Schema and the Information Base” defined what a Conceptual Schema
>is and that the 100% principle applies to validation rules (integrity rules,
>constraints). Most published ontologies hardly cover ½ of the needed
>validation rules as defined in the ISO TR9007 report.
>
> 2. Is the law gigo not applicable to questions asked from the A-box?
>
> 3. Would it help to remark that an OWL ontology is a good step backward
>viewed from the 100% principle of ISO TR9007?
>
> 4. Terry Halpin’s Ph. D. of 1989 formalized conceptual information
>modelling in 1989.
>
> 5. It seems that the conceptual modelling progress made in the seventies
>and eighties in the semantic database research and application community is
>not easily available to the ontology community.
>
> 6. The limitations and inconveniencies of binary models have been
>extensively discussed at many conferences in the seventies and eighties.
>
>
>
>
>
> Sjir Nijssen
>
>
>
> E-mail: sjir.nijssen@xxxxxxxxxxxx
>
> ----------------------------------------------------
>
> http://www.pna-group.nl
>
> -----Original Message-----
> From: ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
>[mailto:ontolog-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx] On Behalf Of Ed Barkmeyer
> Sent: dinsdag 4 januari 2011 17:09
> To: [ontolog-forum]
> Subject: Re: [ontolog-forum] Quote for the day
>
>
>
> Two somewhat related observations from this thread:
>
>
>
> John F. Sowa wrote:
>
>
>
> > Before we try to sell [business persons] on the idea of using ontologies,
>
> > we have to show them some advantage. They know their business far better
>
> > than we do, they've been running it successfully for a long time, and we
>
> > need to show some clear value in this newfangled O-stuff.
>
> >
>
>
>
> Yes! We have to show them what we can do with ontologies, per se,
>
> because people have also been doing knowledge engineering in the
>
> development of software (/hardware) systems for 50 years. One version of
>
> the sales pitch is that ontologies are the next generation
>
> data/information models -- they focus on the domain concepts and their
>
> relationships and not the software renditions of them. But that alone
>
> generates shelfware. We must show what we can do with these models that
>
> cannot be done with data/information models (and the database schemas
>
> and OOPL classes generated from them). Otherwise we have achieved
>
> formally grounded information models, full stop -- an academic nirvana
>
> with no demonstrated value to the people who pay for model and software
>
> development.
>
>
>
> In the QUOMOS effort, we used a different pitch for the BIPM
>
> (International Bureau of Weights and Measures) folk. We told them there
>
> should be a standard measurements ontology that they controlled, so that
>
> two dozen uneducated software engineering standards teams would have no
>
> excuse for building their own conflicting models and thus making a mess
>
> of 21st century international trade. But in a certain sense, we were
>
> just pitching the ontology to a different set of academics. Their
>
> primary concern is about what is to be measured, what the quality of the
>
> measurement is, and how the measurement and its quality are expressed.
>
> Those specifications are used in government specifications and contract
>
> rules. Industry folk rely on the references to the common standards, and
>
> their specialists use the details of the standards in designing their
>
> quality controls. The idea of the standard ontology is just to ensure
>
> that the BIPM knowledge is what is engineered into the standard form for
>
> the reasoning technologies that will supposedly be used in industry. It
>
> doesn't convey advantage in its own right.
>
>
>
> This leads to observation 2:
>
>
>
> Anders Tell wrote:
>
>
>
> > An old and tired example, the Invoice or RequestForPayment Message.
>
> > Not really a good example since most Invoice ontologies are old
>
> > fashioned, since they are based on modeling paper/document versions of
>
> > Invoices instead of corresponding to requests for reciprocal payment
>
> > for delivery.
>
>
>
> John is correct that business people have been keeping records and
>
> executing business transactions for 4000 years. One of the problems we
>
> have is that they developed standard paper forms for these records and
>
> transactions over 100 years ago, and their first efforts to automate
>
> records and transactions 50 years ago were to create software models of
>
> the paper forms, from which the paper forms could in fact be printed. I
>
> am sad to say that 50 years later, and 30 years after the widespread use
>
> of databases, the UN/CEFACT gang still thinks in modeling paper forms
>
> (electronic documents) for electronic transactions and record keeping.
>
> It is the culture of business administration people to think in terms of
>
> the paper form, rather than its information content. If you customarily
>
> put three different information groups in the same box on the form, but
>
> for somewhat different transactions, they are three different concepts
>
> that have no business content in common. But the administrator will
>
> insist that there is a common supertype, or a common object that
>
> subsumes them all by having a set of undefined text components.
>
>
>
> So in order to provide value for business ontologies, we have to
>
> overcome this mentality and demonstrate substantial improvement in some
>
> business processes. Anders suggests that we drop the form concept and
>
> concentrate on the information required for each process-at-hand, with
>
> some general categories of message that are standardized, and some
>
> partner-specific refinements. In a certain sense, this is the
>
> ontological version of the CEFACT approach -- defining standard messages
>
> with mostly optional components, each of which has many optional
>
> information elements (with extensive definitions that use many vague and
>
> undefined terms).
>
>
>
> > Anyway, maybe an request for payment could be modeled something along
>
> > these lines:
>
> >
>
> > A Message MOT ala UN/CITRAL: "Communication” means any statement,
>
> > declaration, demand, notice or request, including an offer and the
>
> > acceptance of an offer, that the parties are required to make or
>
> > choose to make in connection with the formation or performance of a
>
> > contract;"
>
> > - with Communication adaptation(extension) point.
>
> >
>
> > RequestForPayment Communication: with reciprocal Delivery and Payment
>
> > Commitments.
>
> > - Reference to a Product MOT with core semantics including the
>
> > recognition that different people view Products differently depending
>
> > of work perspectives, processes, life cycle, etc.
>
> > - with a Product adaptation(extension) point.
>
> >
>
> > An industry adapts their own Product' MOT for their constituents.
>
> >
>
> > Two trading partners adapt and agrees on their own adaptations, based
>
> > on their industry's Product' MOT
>
>
>
> This is the approach of the ISO/OASIS Product LifeCycle Services (PLCS)
>
> standards gang. They allow for successive levels of standardization,
>
> each of which defines common practices for a smaller industry group and
>
> allows for trading partner specializations and adaptations. Their
>
> models, however, are currently written in a combination of EXPRESS (with
>
> an OWL derivative) and XML Schema, so that they actually get implemented
>
> in commercial software. One of the key ideas in PLCS, and Anders'
>
> proposal, is that the reference models are the definitions of the
>
> transactions, and the XML schemas define the organizations of the
>
> corresponding data for exchange purposes.
>
>
>
> > The above is an example of an eco-system view of ontologies.
>
>
>
> After the abuse of this term in OMG and elsewhere, I don't know what an
>
> 'ontology eco-system' might be. So if Anders says this is one, who am I
>
> to argue?
>
>
>
> -Ed
>
>
>
> --
>
> Edward J. Barkmeyer Email: edbark@xxxxxxxx
>
> National Institute of Standards & Technology
>
> Manufacturing Systems Integration Division
>
> 100 Bureau Drive, Stop 8263 Tel: +1 301-975-3528
>
> Gaithersburg, MD 20899-8263 Cel: +1 240-672-5800
>
>
>
> "The opinions expressed above do not reflect consensus of NIST,
>
> and have not been reviewed by any Government authority."
>
>
>
>
>
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