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Ontology Summit 2011 (Pre-launch) Community Input and Planning Session - Thu 2010-12-16

  • Topic: Refining the ideas around the theme and program for OntologySummit2011: "Making the Case for Ontology"
  • Agenda: This is a (pre-launch) communitywide brainstorming and planning session for OntologySummit2011.

Conference Call Details

  • Date: Thursday, 16-December-2010
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Attendees

Abstract

The upcoming Ontology Summit is co-organized by Ontolog, NIST, NCOR, NCBO, IAOA, NCO-NITRD ...

This is the 6th year we are organizing this annual, international, open Ontology Summit event. The general format of the event comprises a series of both virtual and face-to-face activities that span about 3 months (January through March or April each year). These activities include a vigorous three-month online discourse on the theme of the Summit, virtual panel discussions, research activities, and so on, which will culminate in a two-day face-to-face workshop and symposium at NIST in Gaithersburg, Maryland, USA. Each year, we publish a Summit Communiqué to offer a message from the Summit participants to the world-at-large as a signature activity of the Ontology Summit series.

This is a (pre-launch) communitywide brainstorming and planning session for those who are passionate about the subject and would like to influence and help drive the outcome by helping refine the ideas, organization and process, around our challenge of OntologySummit2011: "Making the Case for Ontology."

During this session the Ontology Summit community will get together to discuss the theme, brainstorm on ideas, candidate program, solicit commitments, and make a attempt to get organized for this upcoming Ontology Summit.

At this point, the theme is characterized as follows:

This summit will collect and curate a small number of perspectives and case studies for which we will strive to assemble ROI information (monetary and otherwise) as well as statements of the problem and solution approach, in support of providing solid material to draw upon when making the business case for both the application as well as the R&D investment in Ontology.

Subthemes Groups of participants making the case in the following domains:

  • Healthcare informatics and Biomedical
  • Cyberphysical systems
  • Cloud (massively parallel) computing
  • Traditional engineering applications (civil, mechanical, aerospace)
  • Software engineering, knowledge engineering, systems engineering
  • Enterprise and system architecture
  • Government applications
  • Cybersecurity
  • <please suggest any more you feel have some good examples>

While the original premise was for making the case in a return-on-investment basis, the suggestion has been made that this question could also be framed in terms of making the case:

  • For research investment
  • For using an ontological approach compared to other technical approaches, or tied with new technologies (i.e. on its technical, rather than business, merits)
  • To the general public, to increase awareness and understanding
  • From a business perspective (the original suggestion)

Possible metrics include:

  • Value in terms of productivity, value added, and other benefits
  • Financial ROI
  • Technical quality
  • Risk

Our developing 2011 Ontology Summit home page is at: OntologySummit2011

Agenda & Proceedings

0. Participant self-introduction (if size of participants is manageable) (15~30 seconds each)

1. Introduction and ideas Steve Ray (co-chair) - [ slides ]

2. Open floor for even more ideas on developing and executing the program (All) -- please refer to process above

Brainstorming on ideas that support the "Making the Case for Ontology" theme
o Topics, Speakers, Invitees, Sponsors, Publicity ... and more
o Crafting a program that will allow us to "make the case for Ontology."
o Approach and Execution

3. A call for volunteers ... and, getting ourselves organized.

4. Summary and wrap-up (co-chair)

Proceedings

Please refer to the above

IM Chat Transcript captured during the session

see raw transcript here.

(for better clarity, the version below is a re-organized and lightly edited chat-transcript.)

Participants are welcome to make light edits to their own contributions as they see fit.

Peter P. Yim: .

Welcome to the Ontology Summit 2011 (Pre-launch) Community Input and Planning Session - Thu 2010-12-16

  • Topic: Refining the ideas around theme and program

for Ontology Summit 2011: "Making the Case for Ontology"

  • see details on session page

at: http://ontolog.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?ConferenceCall_2010_12_16

.

anonymous morphed into Jim Disbrow

anonymous morphed into Jim Rhyne

anonymous1 morphed into GerryRadack

anonymous morphed into Nancy Wiegand

anonymous morphed into Rex Brooks

Matthew West morphed into Matthew West

Nicolaguarino2 morphed into Nicola Guarino

anonymous2 morphed into Michael Uschold

Todd Schneider: Need to add some items to 'themes' that represent the enterprise architectural

approach and how ontologies and semantic technologies fit into the larger picture.

anonymous2 morphed into Ram D. Sriram

anonymous2 morphed into Ralph Hodgson

Peter P. Yim: Steve: == how does the week of April 18, 2011 work == ... as a potential time for our

Ontology Summit 2011 symposium (the final 2-day face-to-face workshop). Any conflicts we know of now?

Todd Schneider: April is so far in advance, sure it sounds good.

Ralph Hodgson: ISWSA 2011, Amman, Jordan -

http://www.wikicfp.com/cfp/servlet/event.showcfp?eventid=11367&copyownerid=15408

Ralph Hodgson: http://iswsa.ipu.edu.jo/index.php?c=cfp.htm

Todd Schneider: So, who's traveling to Jordan in April?

Ralph Hodgson: I only found one more event that conflicts: BioPAX -

http://sourceforge.net/apps/mediawiki/biopax/index.php?title=Main_Page

Nicola Guarino: [ref. slide#3] There is also IAOA as co-organizer...

Peter P. Yim: @Nicola - my apologies for inadvertently leaving out IAOA on that slide ... the slide deck

on the session page has now been updated (to reflect the correction)

Todd Schneider: Steve, can we get a video link running from NIST?

Steve Ray: @Todd: I'll raise your request for a NIST video link to our NIST hosts.

Todd Schneider: In addition to a communique, we should consider providing a place where people could

find case studies and success stories (subject to the Ontolog IPR policy).

Peter P. Yim: Steve: == please provide suggestions for themes/subtheme, tracks and successful cases that

we can pursue ==

Nicola Guarino: Theme 1: commercial or societal need...

Todd Schneider: Also have to address how ontologies fit into the bigger picture: How to use them.

Nicola Guarino: @Todd: yes, but first we have to show the importance of them...

Todd Schneider: The value or importance will depend on how they are used.

GaryBergCross: I find the "benefits" a bit commercially focused. This is clearly important but there

are other communities that can profit from use in R&D for example. Perhaps it is the focus on

practical use that leads in this direction.

Steve Ray: @Gary: I think there is room when defining metrics for including research value as well as

commercial considerations.

Peter P. Yim: Nicola: "Scaling" issues could be one that is of interest ... and is being given attention

in Europe

Todd Schneider: Nicola, the scaling problem involves more than just particular technologies. But how

they are used.

Ralph Hodgson: Ontologies as specification models, as inferencing systems for classification, as

basis for model-based reasoning, as process orchestration engines, as vocabulary management systems,

...

Todd Schneider: Ralph [in his verbal remarks] has just enumerated many of the tracks. Or at least the

various aspects that should be addressed.

Ralph Hodgson: Use of ontologies at BBC for the Worldcup 2010 was onotologies as flexible data model

+ aggregation capabilities of RDF/OWL

Todd Schneider: Ralph, would TopQuadrant be able to provide some case studies?

Ralph Hodgson: Yes

Leo Obrst: Electronic commerce is another application domain. Many starts in this area, recently

GoodRelations.

Steve Ray: So I'm hearing we might want to have a track identifying all the different kinds of

application classes

GaryBergCross: The categories are not mutually exclusive. So sociotechnical systems [from

NicolaGuarino's remarks] describe an approach to complex organizational work design that recognizes

the interaction between people and technology in workplaces. Health care has lots of such

interactions.

Todd Schneider: Steve, identifying all application classes may not be beneficial. Most domains can

benefit.

Rex Brooks: Let's not forget emergency management and military applications since we have the largest

market of multi-national corporations, many of which already have put their toes into the ontology

pond.

Ralph Hodgson: @Todd - use of ontologies at Netherlands MoJ for CCTS-based XML Schema Message

building for interoperability in the Justice Domain, use of ontologies at NASA for Units of Measure

(QUDT) and for Telemetry, Commanding for Space Interoperability (TCMX)

Todd Schneider: Perhaps, a partition based on lifecycle (in the context of sales pitch)

Rex Brooks: Making the case to those multi-nationals could open doors to research funding for our

ontological needs.

Steve Ray: We have had some concrete examples identified via email: Lloyds Bank Human Resources; a

technical support call center; an ERP data quality application

DeborahMacPherson: I believe making the case for ontologies to build bridges from relational

databases to web services and data repositories will appeal to a wide audience.

anonymous1 morphed into John F. Sowa

Michael Uschold: The following paper suggests a framework for understanding classifying ontology

applications. http://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.39.6456&rep=rep1&type=pdf

GaryBergCross: The value proposition (benefit) often becomes very rapidly a cost-benefit

calculation. So lowering the "cost" of good semantics is an important part of making this "sales

pitch".

Ralph Hodgson: I posted some slides here on customer case studies -

http://www.scribd.com/doc/40220051/TQ-TBS-Customer-Case-Studies-aRH-v4

Rex Brooks: It would be helpful if we had an ontology of value models of special or particular

interest for various domains could be quickly referenced. That way we have a better chance of

speaking to any given market's interest and values.

Mike Bennett: Possible case: financial industry - common terms and definitions as industry benefit;

also regulatory reform.

Michael Uschold: Section three of the following paper considers varoius roles and value propositions

for ontologies. "Ontologies: principles, methods and applications" -

http://starlab.vub.ac.be/teaching/uschold.pdf

Matthew West: I think it is worth considering the situations in which ontologies can add value. These

include: - When definitions need to be shared across (or within) organizations - When data needs to

be shared between disparate systems - when information needs to be provided in a more timely manner

and inferencing will provide the automation that will provide that timeliness

Ralph Hodgson: @Matthew - see slide 22 of

http://www.scribd.com/doc/40220051/TQ-TBS-Customer-Case-Studies-aRH-v4 for a 2 by 2 on "Putting

Ontologies to Work"

Matthew West: @Ralph - yes that covers most of the things I have.

Peter P. Yim: please review some of the guideline I've posted earlier today (as rules of engagement) -

http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ontology-summit/2010-12/msg00095.html

Peter P. Yim: I have two process ideas to suggest: (a) building a collection of sound-bites and quotable

quotes (to help make our case), (b) Making the Case, for and against, Ontology in an IQ-squared

style debate and measuring success by seeing how many minds each side is able to change (ref.

http://intelligencesquaredus.org/index.php/about-us) ... debater nominations solicited

Todd Schneider: Peter, with or without beer?

Peter P. Yim: @Todd - without beer ... we might get too incoherent for ontologists otherwise

Mike Bennett: Theme: Ontology as business conceptual model versus Ontology as component of a solution

(there is case to be made for each)

Todd Schneider: Unfortunately, this problem space (the sales pitch) seems to have multiple orthogonal

dimensions

GaryBergCross: In SOCoP (geospatial Apps) there's an agreement that Country Codes offers a simple

opportunity to show the value of ontologies. Among the reason underlie this agreement that there is

a need to address a real problem of different country code being used in US Agencies as well as

internationally due to new ISO Standards and the expiration of the US FIPS standard. Work groups are

now seeking was of implementing regional codes and of cross walking between old codes and new. So

ontologies and semantics can be an effective part of the solution and can be incorporated into

current geospatial services for discovery, query, display and publishing.

Michael Uschold: Ideas for Suggested Tracks

1.Design a framework for describing and characterizing ontology applications that everyone can fill

out and be basis of a catalog. 2.Analysis of case studies: what worked, what did not and why,

lessons learned 3.Considering various roles and value propositions for ontologies a.Ontology driven

information systems b.Ontology for search applications c.Ontology for interoperability 4.Based on

Industry Sectors catalog of ontology applications a.Life Sciences b.Finance c.Media etc. 5.Measuring

the value considering metrics etc.

Todd Schneider: Have to go. Thank you. I'll champion aspects of architecture, if needed.

Steve Ray: What I heard Ralph Hodgson suggest: 1. Presenting what an ontology is 2. Capability cases

3. Barriers

Matthew West: The benefits come from improving the clarity, consistency, and timeliness of

information used in key decisions. If you look for examples of where bad decisions have been made,

you can often find that a lack of these was a contributory factor, and the cost of the bad decision

is often all too available.

Mike Bennett: @Matthew you mean like the fall-out from the financial crisis?

GaryBergCross: I agree with Michael Uschold on the value of designing a framework for describing and

characterizing ontology applications but our examples might address benefits for government and

education as well as "commercial needs".

Ralph Hodgson: @Michael - +1 to all your suggestions

GaryBergCross: So do we have a track on Best Practices for Success?

Matthew West: @Mike - yes, and some problems with oil in the wrong place in the Gulf of Mexico.

Rex Brooks: Much of these studies and frameworks are examples of what I meant by the need for a value

model ontology, an ontology of value models, perhaps by application domain.

anonymous1 morphed into Pavithra Kenjige

Peter P. Yim: there are 3 Mike's on the call, please refer to them with their full name (in WikiWord

format)

GerryRadack: Ontology for data quality.

Nicola Guarino: I support Michael's proposal very much. Just a couple of remarks:

GaryBergCross: I hope that we have a Panel "track" as well as talks to discuss some of this at the

Summit.

Ralph Hodgson: @MichaelUshold - great ideas - +1

anonymous morphed into Pavithra Kenjige

Matthew West: The Oil and Process Industries can provide supply chain case studies. They are also

available for the use/charging for copyright material

Michael Uschold: Agree with Nicola - on need to align requirements for ontologies with the kinds of

ontologies needed.

Peter P. Yim: I want to endorse the earlier posts from Todd Schneider

(http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ontology-summit/2010-12/msg00032.html) and Ali Hashemi

(http://ontolog.cim3.net/forum/ontology-summit/2010-12/msg00091.html) and want want to draw people

attention to them, and to make sure the organizing committee give them due consideration when

crafting the approach and tracks

Mike Bennett: On government, it's worth noting that in the US the regulators are starting to ask

questions with the word "Ontology" in them, in terms of compliance to Dood/Frank

Mike Denny: I am part of a team implementing net-centric enterprise information exchange across the

US Air Force that is semantically informed by formal domain vocabularies built by Communities of

Interest. I would be interested in joining with others in this forum who would like to establish

some activity at the Ontology Summit that attempts to illuminate the tangible and less tangible

benefits of ontology for data modeling and Web service development within the enterprise.

Matthew West: @MikeDenny - If I make the Summit I would be interested in that.

GaryBergCross: The Marine Metadata Interoperability Project has some demo success stories to report

(http://marinemetadata.org/)on coastal and marine data.

Michael Uschold: The Marine Metadata Interoperability link is not working.

GaryBergCross: For MMI (Marine Metadata Interoperability) try http://marinemetadata.org/node

DeborahMacPherson: I've just reached out to some people working on the International Framework for

Dictionaries, which is a framework for the building industry where different ontologies can

co-exist. [1] most

people are in Europe but seeing if they can get engaged in the discussion or possibly come join the

workshop.

Ram D. Sriram: @Deborah - Regarding the IFD library: Are these ontologies actually being used in the

industry?

DeborahMacPherson: RE: IFD Library - yes and no - not being used by architects and engineers enough,

is used by data warehouses and software developers. End users just keep making up their own

definitions for what things are and how they are related

Nicola Guarino: @John: [responding to his verbal remarks] Yes, interoperability requirements depend

on who you are interoperating with, but in many cases you don't know your partner in advance...

Michael Uschold: Agree with John, elaborating on Nicola's point. Nicola is right in general, that an

ontology for interoperability will typicaly need more depth than one for search. John shows how we

need to dig a bit deeper to get the full picture.

Michael Uschold: I'm here, I will try to do that

Peter P. Yim: == Candidate Track Inputs now ==

Peter P. Yim: Please supply submit via the chat-board, candidate "Tracks" - title (no more than 5

words); if possible, along with a brief description (no more than 30 words)

Michael Uschold: 1.Ontology Application Framework 2.Analysis of Case Studies 3.Roles/Uses of

Ontologies 4.Industry sectors for ontology applications 5.Value metrics

Mike Bennett: Track: Ontology as application v ontology for domain knowledge

Rex Brooks: Value-Models: What values are appropriate arguments for domains--I don't really have the

time to champion this, but I would work with a champion.

Ralph Hodgson: @MikeBennett - Ontologies as specification models - see slide 22 of the scribd

presentation also other slides at the back

Michael Uschold: To Mike Bennett - this is covered in the roles/uses of ontologies. One use is a basis

for an application, another use is to keep a record of a body of knowledge.

Mike Bennett: @MichaelUschold - agreed

Nicola Guarino: 1. Ontologies of (for) socio-technical systems; 2. deep vs. lightweight ontologies

Michael Uschold: How do you get a formal reference to a persons as in @MIkeBennet, is it just to type

it in?

Rex Brooks: @MichaelUschold: Value Metrics would be part of Value Models.

Ralph Hodgson: Ontology Architecture as a theme

GaryBergCross: Perhaps the overall structure for the workshop is to have a track for some general

discussion that is followed by more specific topical tracks that fit within the App framework set up

in the general track. This would be followed by a panel discussion.

Ralph Hodgson: QA Metrics for Ontologies - as part of Ontology Engineering theme

DeborahMacPherson: Propose a Track for using ontologies to link up disparate domains. For example,

15926 from it's history to future - process plants before, buildings and energy now. - another

option is getting from relational databases to web services, SOA and more familiar terms.

Rex Brooks: By Value Models I mean things like Values for good/workable/useful ontologies as one,

while the value of a interoperability ontology to emergency management would be another.

GaryBergCross: I'm surprised that no one (on this call) has volunteered (or volunteered others) to

cover Success Stories for Ontologies and Data Integration in the Biomedical domain. See for example:

http://www.lhncbc.nlm.nih.gov/lhc/docs/published/2008/pub2008024.pdf which also covers "Challenging

Issues"

Peter P. Yim: given the earlier partnership MichaelUschold-MichaelGruninger work, I nominate them as

co-chairs or one of the track co-champions (on a track of their choice)

Peter P. Yim: @MikeUschold - could you take one on? with Gruninger? ... if so, which one (of the 5 you

proposed) would be your favorite?

Michael Uschold: I'll have to ponder this. It will be certainly easier for me to lead the effort that

is based on my work.

Nicola Guarino: @Peter: I definitely support your proposal. However, we are just collecting

volunteers for tracks (and tracks proposals) now. Co-chairs will be appointed later...

Peter P. Yim: @Nicola - yes ... however, I just wanted to make sure Mike Uschold doesn't "hate" me for

volunteering him here!

GaryBergCross: For a track can we get someone to discuss Ontology Design Patterns (ODPs) as a Best

practice? The recent 2nd Workshop on Ontology Patterns probably had some success examples of their

use.

Steve Ray: Mills Davis suggests Dennis Wisnosky (DoD) as a speaker

Ram D. Sriram: There are a number of good applications of biomedical ontologies reported by by NCBO

(http://www.bioontology.org/). I think most of these applications are in research organizations.

GaryBergCross: I for one think success in research organizations is good to have at the Summit. They

can often be the leading edge for later commercial work.

Michael Uschold: @Ralph [referring to his verbal remarks] - this is hotly contested. Some say

ontologies are not needed for linked data. Indeed, if you look at they BBC example, you don't see

much talk about how an ontology was used or if so, how it helped.

Ralph Hodgson: @MichaelUschold - is the "this" of your remark referring to how schema-based LOD is?

Michael Uschold: @Ralph - yes, sorry for not being clear.

GaryBergCross: Does FOIS 2010 have anything to suggest on a track?

Michael Uschold: There is another track, it might be called a marketing/presentation track that

focused on how to get the message out to the public. All other groups would feed in to this one.

GaryBergCross: I like the idea of at least a talk on the ontology "marketing" idea - towards the end

of the workshop..

Michael Uschold: When people talk about speakers, when and where will they speak? At upcoming

telecons? At the summit? Im unclear.

Peter P. Yim: yes ... mainly at virtual panel sessions

Michael Uschold: @Peter - ok, thanks.

Pavithra Kenjige: thanks for inviting

Leo Obrst: I use a slide for educational purposes that plots the expressivity of an ontology (really,

semantic models, ranging from taxonomy to thesaurus to conceptual model to logical theory,

underscoring that "more expressive semantic models enable more complex applications", with

applications ranging from simple search extensions to enhanced search/navigation and

cross-referencing of documents, to enterprise modeling and question anwering, to semantic search and

interoperability applications.

Peter P. Yim: -- session ended: 13:10 pm PST --

- end of in-session chat-transcript -

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