Dear Paul, (01)
As one of those responsible for ISO 15926 I will hazard an answer to some
of these questions. (02)
Regards (03)
Matthew West (04)
> -----Original Message-----
> From: ontac-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx
> [mailto:ontac-forum-bounces@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx]On Behalf Of Paul S Prueitt
> Sent: 24 November 2005 15:30
> To: ONTAC-WG General Discussion
> Subject: RE: [ontac-forum] Why Build Yet Another Upper Ontology?
>
>
> I liked what I saw in the ISO 15926 Part 1, where there is a general
> ontology. (05)
MW: Actually it is Part 2, Part 1 is a introduction to the series. (06)
>
> http://www.infowebml.ws/ECM4.5/ECM4.5.html (07)
MW: You have been busy to find this website. The ECM here refers to the
EPISTLE Core Model, which is the name under which the model was developed.
This version perports to be ECM 4.5. The version standardised as ISO 15926-2
was in fact ECM 4.5.1, so there will be some differences. The previous link
you have used to SC4Online is authoritative.
>
> It also has the flavor of a object oriented class hierarchy,
> and thus has
> the usefulness that so many programmers have become aware of.
> Inheritance,
> encapsulation,
>
> I have a question for those here.
>
> Why is ISO 15926 not sufficient as a general ontology for web services
> across all "business exchanges". Has the generality of this
> set of 201
> entities been tested in other domains - not oil and gas. (08)
MW: As I mentioned elsewhere, it is being used by Shell to model its Downstream
Business, so financial transactions, customer relationships, geographic objects.
A good distance from refinery and offshore equipment. It was always intended
that it should be suitable more widely, but a clear focus is also helpful in
developing an upper ontology. (09)
> Is
> there a move
> towards ending the standard setting process and actually
> using this specific
> set of "entities" in oil and gas? (010)
MW: They (or their predecessors) have been in use for the last 10 years,
especially
in the Norwegian Offshore industry. However, there is no end to the
standardisation
in sight. Part 2 is considered relatively stable, but there is a great deal of
effort
currently going on at the next level down in the Oil and Gas equipment domain
so
that designs of offshore oil rigs (with a value usually in excess of $2b) can be
handed over from contractors to owner/operators. We need a common language for
things
like pumps and valves, as well as the more abstract concepts in ISO 15926-2.
These
are being stanadardised in Part 3, and an ISO Register is proposed to hold
these and
to allow extension of them (not necessarily restricted to Oil and Gas).
>
> As long as the standards are not stable, the businesses that
> benifit are
> limitied to those few that are developing standards. (011)
MW: I agree. Dissemination takes a while (years) and people are naturally
reluctant
to commit to something they think will change. On the other hand, our experience
has been that those that did take the plunge found significant benefits from
doing
so. (012)
> The larger
> (theoritical) value from the notion of Semantic Web (that
> part which is
> correct) is not accessable, if the bulk of the standards are not set.
>
> If there was an ontology hub (freely available sets of
> entities such as ISO
> 15926) where each industry adopted and modified (see the
> original ISO 15926)
> would we see the end to the standardization processes? (013)
MW: Not for a long time. I expect that for Oil and Gas we will be adding to ISO
15926
for at least 10 years. There are incremental benefits to be gained as more is
added
(i.e. you do not have to wait ten years). The question for me is "When do you
have
enough critical mass to present a compelling business case?" I can only say
"not yet".
>
> I mean, the end to uncertaintly. I do not mean a closed
> system where every
> element is set forever. (014)
MW: Not sure what this means. You always rely on people using the ontology
correctly.
As one of my colleagues says "You can't stop dumb people doing dumb things"
which he
puts together with "we are all dumb at leas some of the time". (015)
MW: But I'm an engineer, so my aim is better, not perfect.
>
> I would also like to point to OASIS standards
>
> http://www.oasis-open.org/specs/index.php
>
> in particular to
>
> http://www.oasis-open.org/committees/ebxml-cppa/documents/ebcp
p-2.0.pdf
which is an detailed set of specifications for electronic business XML
collaboration protocol profiles. (016)
for example: (017)
The role element has the following attributes:
a required name attribute
a fixed xlink:type attribute
a required xlink:href attribute (018)
I ask again, why the standardization process is not coming to a completion,
given that specifications like that OASIS specification were largely
completed in 2002. (019)
see also
http://www.ontologystream.com/beads/nationalDebate/201.htm (020)
I am reminded of John Sowa's recent note to me regarding the need to
legislate standards. (021)
In a note from (022)
http://www.ontologystream.com/beads/nationalDebate/206.htm (023)
we do not see any reference to OASIS. Why is this? (024)
In summary, a reference ontology seems to be about concepts used within a
domain space, (I am thinking about the domain of all e-commerce activity).
So the (025)
http://www.oasis-open.org/specs/index.php#cppav2 (026)
could be a reference ontology that has specific specifications that allow
interoperability between "things" that need to interoperate. Why is this
not the end to the standardization process? (027)
Again, the imposition of a "logic" or something like lattices for use in
inferencing, seems to be the imposition that kills clarity. (028)
A hub of reference models is what the B-2-B transaction space needs. Yes? (029)
MW: I think so, with mappings between them. But I don't think this will
bring the end of standardisation. The nice thing about standards, as you
effectively point out here, is that there are so many to choose from. The
reason for this is that invention is the mother of necessity. It is often
easier to reinvent something than to find the original invention and use
it. People also just have different ideas about how to do things, so they
go off into their own part of the woods and do it their way. This is a
good thing in something as immature as ontology development. As the
area matures, there will be a natural aggregation around one or two of
these developments. I think the best we can do is to provide an environment
in which this can happen. What I do not think we should do is to pick one
and stiffle development of others (one of which might have the seeds of
where we really should be going). (030)
MW: I think an ontology hub would encourage aggregation, whilst enabling
differentiation. It will encourage "stealing from the best with pride"
and make reinvention (especially when worse than the original) unnecessary
and expensive compared to reuse. (031)
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