March 7, 2007

11:15 AM - 12:15 PM

Level: Intermediate

The hot new buzzwords in the data management world are actually taken from ancient Greek philosophy: Semantics and Ontology. Ontology asks the question "what actually exists?", and semantics is about how to describe it. Some data modelers have been trying to capture the semantics of organizations for many years, but this dimension of data modeling has taken on new importance as attempts to integrate systems that speak different "languages" have brought the topic to the forefront. Among other things, the Web Ontology Language (OWL) has been created to describe a company's ontology in a way that makes it possible to manipulate it with a computer. This paper will describe the language, its relationship to data modeling, and its strengths and weaknesses.
Topics included will be:

• A history of the language and its relationship to the Semantic Web.
• Its basic syntax.
• Its relationship to data modeling: the two techniques approach essentially the same problem from two very different directions.
• Using OWL to draw inferences from data.
• The limitations of OWL.

A veteran of the Information Industry since the days of punched cards, paper tape, and teletype machines, Dave Hay has been producing data models to support strategic information planning and requirements planning for over twenty years. In addition to work for various government agencies, he has worked in a variety of commercial industries, including, among others, banking, pharmaceuticals, oil refining, manufacturing, and broadcast.

He is President of Essential Strategies, Inc., a consulting firm dedicated to helping clients define corporate information architecture, identify requirements, and plan strategies for the implementation of new systems.