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May 18, 2009

AI3:::Adaptive Information (Mike Bergman) — Ontology Best Practices for Data-driven Applications: Part 2

The Fundamental Importance of Keeping an ABox and TBox Split

It is perhaps not surprising that the first substantive post in this occasional series on ontology best practices for data-driven applications begins with the importance of keeping an ABox and TBox split. Structured Dynamics has been beating the tom - tom for quite a while on this topic. We reiterate and expand on this position in this post.

The Relation to Description Logics

Description logics (DL) are one of the key underpinnings to the semantic Web. DL are a logic semantics for knowledge representation (KR) systems based on first-order predicate logic ( FOL ). They are a kind of logical metalanguage that can help describe and determine (with various logic tests) the consistency, decidability and inferencing power of a given KR language. The semantic Web ontology languages , OWL Lite and OWL DL (which stands for description logics), are based on DL and were themselves outgrowths of earlier DL languages.

Description logics and their semantics traditionally split concepts and their relationships from the different treatment of instances and their attributes and roles, expressed as fact assertions. The concept split is known as the TBox (for terminological knowledge, the basis for T in TBox ) and represents the schema or taxonomy of the domain at hand. The TBox is the structural and intensional component of conceptual relationships. It is this construct for which Structure Dynamics generally reserves the term “ontology”.

The second split of instances is known as the ABox (for assertions , the basis for A in ABox ) and describes the attributes of instances (or individuals), the roles between instances, and other assertions about instances regarding their class membership with the TBox concepts. Both ...

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