Title: Exploring OWL and rules: a simple teaching case

Authors: Malgorzata Mochol, Anne Cregan, Denny Vrandecic, Sean Bechhofer

Addresses: Freie Universitat Berlin, Germany. ' National ICT Australia (NICTA), University of New South Wales, Australia. ' AIFB, Universitat Karlsruhe (TH), Germany. ' University of Manchester, UK

Abstract: This study includes developing a suitable ontology to represent a simple domain using an ontology editor, representing logical constraints using constructs available within OWL-DL, and then illustrating that some of the classification criteria set for the task cannot be represented within OWL and require logical rules to be added using a rule language to achieve the desired functionality. An automated reasoner is used for classification and the impact of the Open World Assumption on classification results is examined. The case supports hands-on exercises using Semantic Web tools and languages to represent a simple domain, giving exposition of the underlying logical formalisms.

Keywords: semantic web; ontology; OWL; web ontology language; rules; automated reasoner; SWRL; semantic web rule language; teaching; case study.

DOI: 10.1504/IJTCS.2008.022984

International Journal of Teaching and Case Studies, 2008 Vol.1 No.4, pp.299 - 318

Published online: 06 Feb 2009 *

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