Barry, (01)
Any software that is widely used is always evolving from one version
to the next. IBM coined the term "functionally stabilized" as a
euphemism for software that has been declared obsolete and is not
being maintained. Anything else must be considered work in progress. (02)
Professional software developers make some limited claims in their
licenses, but usually back up those claims with nothing more than a
refund of the purchase price. For open source software or ontologies,
any guarantees are worth exactly as much as the price -- ZERO. (03)
> My idea is that the OOR gatekeeper function would include basic things like:
>
> a guarantee that the ontology has passed certain dynamic tests
> a guarantee that the ontology is open source
> a guarantee that the ontology has unique IDs for its terms and acceptable
> versioning policies
> a guarantee that the ontology is adequately labeled
> a guarantee that the ontology has a plurality of users (04)
The gatekeeper should ensure that the contributors have donated the
ontologies as open source and that they conform to a standard policy
for versioning and labeling. The metadata should also state which
tests have been passed and any reviews or comments by users. (05)
> The OBO Foundry (http://obofoundry.org) is working towards a situation where
> Foundry ontologies will have been peer reviewed for accuracy as
>representations
> of the corresponding domain; in the even longer run towards a situation where
> they will be one unique recommended Foundry ontology for each domain
>biomedical
> domain. (06)
Peer review is important, but the most authoritative peers are users
who have actually tested the ontologies on practical applications. (07)
For any product, including an ontology, the best recommendations are
the reviews and reports from users that are recorded in the metadata.
As the reviews accumulate, prospective users can decide for themselves
which ontologies are best suited for their purpose(s). (08)
John (09)
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