Dear Matthew, (01)
my comments are in line below
Best
Fabian (02)
matthew.west@xxxxxxxxx wrote:
> Dear Fabian,
>
> Well most of this looks OK, but see my comments below.
>
> Regards
>
> Matthew West
> Reference Data Architecture and Standards Manager
> Shell International Petroleum Company Limited
> Registered in England and Wales
> Registered number: 621148
> Registered office: Shell Centre, London SE1 7NA, United Kingdom
>
> Tel: +44 20 7934 4490 Mobile: +44 7796 336538
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>
> Dear All
> I would like to kick off the discussion about Quality and
> Gatekeeping. The Ontology Summit 2008 is only a few weeks away and
> there is much to do! As the title of the discussion thread
> suggests, we have two tasks: We need to develop a set of minimal
> requirements that any ontology needs to fulfill in order to be
> accepted as part of the Open Ontology Repository (= Gatekeeping).
> Further, we need to discuss the different ways the quality of an
> ontology within the OOR can be evaluated and what kind of services
> the OOR needs to provide to support these kinds of evaluation.
>
> I suggest that we start with the gate keeping discussion: What are
> the minimal criteria that an ontology needs to meet in order to be
> accepted as part of the OOR? I would suggest to set the bar rather
> low and only focus on criteria that ensure that it will be easy
> for the community to use the ontology as resource.
>
> Here is a list of requirements that would do that (some of these
> principles are adopted from the OBO Foundry): <!--[endif]-->**
>
> MW: Well you could consider me as the "custodian" of ISO 15926 for
> these purposes, so let us see how these apply here. Actually the first
> one is easily the toughest.
>
> *1. The ontology is open and available to be used under the
> Creative Commons Attribution license without any constraint other
> than (a) its origin must be acknowledged and (b) it is not to be
> altered and subsequently redistributed under the original name.*
> <!--[endif]-->
>
> This criterion is a specification of what "open" in "Open Ontology
> Repository" means.
>
> MW: Not really, at least if it is, all we know is that an open
> ontology is an ontology that is open and ....
>
> MW: What being open means in standardisation circles is that there is
> an open process for its development and the resolution of issues
> raised against it, which, in principle at least, anyone can take part
> in. It is this anyone being able to take part which makes it open. ISO
> 15925 meets this definition of open.
>
> MW: Now ISO 15926 is of course ISO copyright and certainly does not
> have a Creative Commons Attribution license, but you can access the
> computer interpretable form from the internet for free, and indeed the
> basic documentation, though you have to pay for the full
> documentation. It might also be a problem if you made a copy available
> (republishing) without authority, rather than pointing to the
> original. Is it your intention to exclude material of this kind? Or do
> you intend to modify the requirement? (03)
I think this topic is large enough for an own discussion thread. I'll
send a separate email to the list. (04)
> 2. *The ontology is expressed in a formal language with a
> well-defined syntax. *
>
> Obviously, an ontology is going to be more valuable to a large
> audience if it is expressed in a widely used formal language, but
> the repository is not restricted to those. The authors are
> required to provide a reference to a document that specifies a
> grammar of the formal language. <!--[endif]-->
>
> MW: Well ISO 15926 is available in EXPRESS and OWL both of which have
> appropriate documentation.
>
> 3. *The authors of the ontology provide the required metadata.*
>
> Pat Hayes and Michael Gruninger are championing a discussion about
> the ontology of ontologies and metadata. This requirement will
> enforce the use of the result of this discussion since it ensures
> that no ontology can be submitted without providing the necessary
> metadata. The goal is to enable users to quickly survey the
> available ontologies and find the right ones for them.
>
> MW: You need to say what that is, and it needs to be reasonable, but
> this should be a problem.
>
This clause is a only a place holder until we know the results the
discussion about ontology of ontologies and metadata. Why do you expect
this requirement to be a problem? Or is a "not" missing above? (05)
> 4.* The ontology has a clearly specified and clearly delineated
> scope.*
>
> The specification of the scope is strictly speaking part of the
> metadata but important enough to mention it explicitly. It enables
> potential users to get an idea what a given ontology is about
> without browsing the ontology.
> <!--[endif]-->
>
> MW: And if it is an upper ontology, so it does not really have a
> limited scope? Is it enough to say it is an upper ontology?
> (06)
Yes. If it is an upper ontology, then it's scope is to provide the top
level classification of all entities. That is a decent description of
the scope of the ontology and it allows the user what to expect and what
not to expect within the ontology. (07)
> 5. *The ontology provider has procedures for identifying distinct
> successive versions.*
>
> <!--[if !supportEmptyParas]--><!--[endif]-->
> I'll post this list also on the QualityAndGatekeeping wiki page:
>
>http://ontolog.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?OntologySummit2008_QualityAndGatekeeping
> This page will be updated with summaries of our discussion.
>
> MW: ISO does this, but there can be idiosynchasies I won't go into here.
>
> Best
> Fabian
>
>
> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>
>
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