Ontologies

1
Ontologies

• IS 277
• Spring 2005

2
Outline

• Ontologies
• Types of ontologies
• Examples
• Ontology engineering
• Ontology standards
• Machine-readable ontologies

3
Ontologies

• Ontos logos
• A theory of existence
• What the world is made of
• But only a theory
• Machine-readable

4
Types of ontologies

• Document
• Metadata
• Domain
• Service

5
Examples

• Atomism
• Data models
• Taxonomies / classifications
• Controlled vocabularies
• Cataloguing standards

6
Ontology engineering

• Well-defined
• Coherent
• Extensible
• Modular
• Layered
• Independent of applications
• Minimal commitments

7
Ontology standards

• Islands of automation
• User groups
• Standards organizations
• Can fail
• Multiple, diverse standards
• Translation among them

8
Machine-readable ontologies

• Standardized ways of writing down ontology
  standards
• XML, RDF, and OWL
• Meaning conferred by software