WorkPackage 3
Objectives
To develop a library of "minimal foundational ontologies" (roughly of the size of a few hundred concepts) that will supplement the toolkit developed in WP2. These ontologies will provide a carefully crafted taxonomic backbone with a sound high level structure that can be used as the basis for the development of more detailed domain ontologies and for the semantic integration and harmonisation of existing ontologies and metadata standards. This will improve both the speed and accuracy of ontology development (e.g., in WP5.2) as well as providing a principled mechanism for the semantic integration task addressed in WP4.
Description of work
The work will consist of 3 main parts:
- A review of the current state of the art of ontology design methodologies.
- The development of a library of foundational ontologies that will supplement the toolkit developed in WP2. Input from WP5.2 and from members of the industrial advisory board will be used to help determine the requirements for and utility of these ontologies.
- Participation in ontology standardisation efforts, in particular the IEEE SUO and World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) activities.
Deliverables
- D15 Ontology Roadmap: A report on the current state of the art in ontology design methodologies and a roadmap of major ontological design choices.
- D16 Ontology Methodologies: A report on methodological guidelines for designing well-founded ontologies.
- D17 Ontology Library (preliminary): A preliminary version of the ontology library including at least a minimal ontology of objects and events.
- D18 Ontology Library (final): A final version of the ontology library, including ontologies of objects and events and of information and information processing.
- D19 Standardisation Report: A report on the progress of the IEEE SUO and W3C standardisation activities.
Milestones and expected result
The expected result of this workpackage is a library of "minimal foundational ontologies" that will supplement the toolkit developed in WP2.
- MS2 Preliminary ontology library (month 6).
- MS8 Final ontology library (month 24).
