Template libraries for modular ontologies

1. Topic

how online template libraries that support specific ontologies should be built, made available, and maintained

… pointing to a need for new OTTR annotations.

2. Parallel ontologies and templates

3. Ontology dependencies

A typical OWL ontology has dependencies

explicit

imported ontologies, in a “modular” ontology

implicit

informal reuse of selected resources, such as skos:definition, dcterms:issued, or foaf:img

If an import changes, the semantics may change, and reasoning reveals the change. Thanks to changes higher up, your subordinate ontology has been rendered inconsistent.

If a cherry-picked, external resource changes at origin, impact may go undetected.

4. POSC Caesar PLM RDL owl:imports

5. OTTR template dependencies

Any OTTR template has dependencies

• on other templates, also in other libraries ✔
• on vocabularies, typically ontologies ?

6. Template versions and dependencies

Described in The Core OTTR Template Library (M. Skjæveland, 2021).

The relation between modules and packages is that packages may, and usually will, rely on modules, while a module should not depend on any package. Templates in packages may mature to become part of or form new modules.

Version scheme.

http://tpl.ottr.xyz/[module name]/[version number]/[template name]
http://tpl.ottr.xyz/p/[package name]/[version number]/[template name]

7. ottr.xyz Pizza example

• Ontology http://www.co-ode.org/ontologies/pizza/2.0.0
• Namespace http://www.co-ode.org/ontologies/pizza/pizza.owl#
• Template library http://tpl.ottr.xyz/pizza/

@prefix pz:         <http://www.co-ode.org/ontologies/pizza/pizza.owl#>.
...
o-pizza:PizzaTopping[
  ...
  o-owl-ax:SubClassOf(?blank505, pz:PizzaTopping),

The PizzaTopping template uses the pz:PizzaTopping ontology class, so may be said to depend on the Pizza ontology.

8. Template annotations

Section 4.2.3. Versioning and template IRI design:

• Signature : label, description, scope and editorial notes, related resources
• Provenance : time of creation and update, authors and contributors
• Version : status, version number, references to previous and next versions
• ChangeNote : change description, including author and timestamp of the change
• Example : explanatory examples of the template
• Deprecated : mark the template as deprecated, including an explanation of why
• Parameter : parameter description, example, notes

These don’t provide a default way to refer to the ontology needed to interpret the results of expansion.

9. New docTTR template(s) proposal

Add to http://tpl.ottr.xyz/p/docttr/

• “Recommended ontology for interpreting output”
• The results of expansion should be included in an ontology that owl:imports the recommended ontology

10. New annotation properties

Add to the OTTR vocabulary

• “Library used to build this ontology”
• “Recommended template library for instantiating this ontology”

11. What’s the use?

Coordinate the evolution of ontologies with the templates

• used to build them;
• that instantiate them with data.

Quality check: does the template output axioms that are consistent with the target ontology?

Thanks

Contact: [email protected]