Data Models, Ontologies, Legacy Systems, Communities, and Semantic Webs

Abstract

Almost all examples of so-called ontologies in today's research literature on the Semantic Web are in fact just their author's (extended) data model for a particular, a priori known, application that author has in mind. Ontologies as computer-based repositories of a domain's semantics however should not be bound to the context of a single "application". Indeed they must express a form of agreement, in an "application-independent" language, on the concepts, relationships, events, rules and processes present in that domain. Agreements in turn imply (virtual) communities of users and/or developers collaborating towards such a shared, formal, understanding. Enterprises today that want to deploy IT activity on "the" semantic web are confronted with multiple such webs, and the general ignorance of the research community of the legacy data problem and issues of scalability.

In the DOGMA Framework (Developing Ontology-Grounded Methodology and Applications) in VUB STARLab we study the theoretical foundations of ontologies and of collaborative ontology engineering, and are building an experimental tool suite to illustrate the principles that we claim are involved such as scalability and involving non-computer trained domain experts. This seminar reports on some results and applications as well as difficulties.

About Robert Meersman

Robert A. Meersman is full professor in the Department of Computer Science of the Vrije Universiteit Brussel where he leads the laboratory of Semantics Technology and Applications Research (VUB STARLab) since 1995. From 1986 until 1995 he was full professor at the KUB (Department BIK) in Tilburg, The Netherlands. He teaches database and information system courses, both introductory and advanced and he has been invited speaker and lecturer at international conferences, universities and institutes worldwide. VUB STARLab runs several sizeable European and national scientific projects (OntoBasis, FF Poirot, DIP, Co-Drive, PROLIX, .) and has participated and participates in a number of 5th and 6th Framework EU Networks (OntoWeb, CCFORM, InnovaNet, KnowledgeWeb).

Professor Meersman has been Chairman of IFIP WG 2.6, the Working Group on Database and first Chairman of IFIP TC12, the Technical Committee on Artificial Intelligence. In June 2003 he was elected Chairman of IFIP TC2 (Software Theory and Practice). He is a recipient of the IFIP Silver Core Award. Within IFIP WG 2.6 he created the Database Semantics international conference series. He is co-founder and former President of the non-profit International Foundation for Cooperative Information Systems (IFCIS) which organized the yearly CoopIS conference, now part of the large OnTheMove2006 Federated Conferences, last in Montpellier, France, November 2006. He is also the President and co-founder of the Distributed Objects Applications Institute v.z.w., another not-for-profit scientific organization. He has been General Chair, Program Committee Chair, Tutorial Chair and PC member of numerous international congresses, conferences, and workshops, and provided consultations to many large companies and organizations worldwide on technical subjects related to databases, the deployment of large information systems, methodologies, and IT tools.

Robert Meersman's current research interests focus on implementing database- and Web-semantics using so-called ontologies, and several STARLab (www.starlab.vub.ac.be) projects funded by EC 5thFP, 6thFP as well as from other sources are under way on this subject. He is the author and co-author of numerous publications in the areas of conceptual modeling, information systems methodologies (in particular NIAM of which he was one of the original researchers) and the formal and empirical semantics of information stored in databases, and of course with recent applications in e-learning, and the unlocking of e-content in general.