To support the sharing and reuse of formally
represented knowledge among AI systems, it is useful to
define the common vocabulary in which shared knowledge
is represented. A specification of a representational
vocabulary for a shared domain of discourse --
definitions of classes, relations, functions, and other
objects -- is called an ontology. This paper describes
a mechanism for defining ontologies that are portable
over representation systems. Definitions written in a
standard format for predicate calculus are translated
by a system called Ontolingua into specialized
representations, including frame-based systems as well
as relational languages. This allows researchers to
share and reuse ontologies, while retaining the
computational benefits of specialized implementations.
We discuss how the translation approach to portability
addresses several technical problems. One problem is
how to accommodate the stylistic and organizational
differences among representations while preserving
declarative content. Another is how to translate from a
very expressive language into restricted languages,
remaining system-independent while preserving the
computational efficiency of implemented systems. We
describe how these problems are addressed by basing
Ontolingua itself on an ontology of domain-independent,
representational idioms.
%0 Journal Article
%1 Gruber:1993
%A Gruber, T. R.
%D 1993
%J Knowledge Acquisition
%K 1993 ontology
%N 2
%T A Translation Approach to Portable Ontology
Specifications
%V 5
%X To support the sharing and reuse of formally
represented knowledge among AI systems, it is useful to
define the common vocabulary in which shared knowledge
is represented. A specification of a representational
vocabulary for a shared domain of discourse --
definitions of classes, relations, functions, and other
objects -- is called an ontology. This paper describes
a mechanism for defining ontologies that are portable
over representation systems. Definitions written in a
standard format for predicate calculus are translated
by a system called Ontolingua into specialized
representations, including frame-based systems as well
as relational languages. This allows researchers to
share and reuse ontologies, while retaining the
computational benefits of specialized implementations.
We discuss how the translation approach to portability
addresses several technical problems. One problem is
how to accommodate the stylistic and organizational
differences among representations while preserving
declarative content. Another is how to translate from a
very expressive language into restricted languages,
remaining system-independent while preserving the
computational efficiency of implemented systems. We
describe how these problems are addressed by basing
Ontolingua itself on an ontology of domain-independent,
representational idioms.
@article{Gruber:1993,
abstract = {To support the sharing and reuse of formally
represented knowledge among AI systems, it is useful to
define the common vocabulary in which shared knowledge
is represented. A specification of a representational
vocabulary for a shared domain of discourse --
definitions of classes, relations, functions, and other
objects -- is called an ontology. This paper describes
a mechanism for defining ontologies that are portable
over representation systems. Definitions written in a
standard format for predicate calculus are translated
by a system called Ontolingua into specialized
representations, including frame-based systems as well
as relational languages. This allows researchers to
share and reuse ontologies, while retaining the
computational benefits of specialized implementations.
We discuss how the translation approach to portability
addresses several technical problems. One problem is
how to accommodate the stylistic and organizational
differences among representations while preserving
declarative content. Another is how to translate from a
very expressive language into restricted languages,
remaining system-independent while preserving the
computational efficiency of implemented systems. We
describe how these problems are addressed by basing
Ontolingua itself on an ontology of domain-independent,
representational idioms.},
added-at = {2009-04-02T11:07:42.000+0200},
author = {Gruber, T. R.},
biburl = {https://www.bibsonomy.org/bibtex/28cf8019e32add3dfd8a8a579694c033d/jeenbroekstra},
interhash = {232576339f9eecc6915dec6a2ee77150},
intrahash = {8cf8019e32add3dfd8a8a579694c033d},
journal = {Knowledge Acquisition},
keywords = {1993 ontology},
number = 2,
timestamp = {2009-04-02T14:33:47.000+0200},
title = {{A Translation Approach to Portable Ontology
Specifications}},
volume = 5,
year = 1993
}