Re: [ontolog-forum] Ontology of Commands

[William Frank <williamf.frank@xxxxxxxxx>]

You bring up what to me is a critical missing ingredient in most computer communications:

a command is a kind of speech act.

consider the _expression_ of a proposition

cat  in box

this gives us a picture of the way something in the world *could* be

a command is a direction to some actor to make the proposition true:

command to Tom (cat in box)

in English, "tom, put the cat in the box"

similary, a question is a speech act

question (cat in box)

in English: is the cat in the box?

invarient rule (cat in box)

in English" the cat must be in the box at all times

statement (cat in box)

In English: the cat IS in the box.

so could be

hope (cat in box)

like when (cat in box)


So, when one systems just sends another a picture of a transaction, what is missing is whether this is a request to make execute the transaction, and what system is expected to carry out the request, versus whether this is an assertion that the transaction has been exectuted, and by whom, etc

When the speech act and the actors are made explicit, the two communcating systems are more loosely coupled to each other, and better interoperation can be achieved.

On Fri, Apr 27, 2012 at 6:17 PM, Burkett, William [USA] <burkett_william@xxxxxxx> wrote:

Hello, Ontologists – I’ve got a question that’s been ping-ponging around my brain lately and thought I’d solicit your input.

 

What is a “command” in an ontological sense?   I can certainly envision a hierarchical part-of structure of commands, but is it accurate to interpret this as a kind of process decomposition (e.g., a Script in the sense of http://www.jfsowa.com/ontology/toplevel.htm)?  While a process connotes a “do”, it doesn’t necessary connote “go do”, as a command/imperative would.   What is a “command” in the real world?

 

Context of question:  In a SOA-based software development effort, how would ontological principles help with naming/function of services and commands offered through the service interface?

 

What do you think?  (Is that a dangerous question to ask this crowd?  ;-))

 

Bill

 

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