Abstract
The main purpose of an enterprise ontology is to promote the common understanding between people across enterprises, as well as to serve as a communication medium between people and applications, and between different applications. This paper outlines a top-level ontology, called the context-based enterprise ontology, which aims to advance the understanding of the nature, purposes and meanings of things in enterprises with providing basic concepts for conceiving, structuring and representing things within contexts and/or as contexts. The ontology is based on the contextual approach according to which a context involves seven domains: purpose, actor, action, object, facility, location, and time. The concepts in the ontology are defined in English and presented in meta models in a UML-based ontology engineering language.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution.
Buying options
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Learn about institutional subscriptionsPreview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
References
Aguilar-Savén, R.S.: Business process modelling: review and framework. International Journal of Production Economics 90(2), 129–149 (2004)
Allen, J.: Towards a general theory of action and time. Artificial Intelligence 23(2), 123–154 (1984)
Baclawski, K., et al.: Extending UML to support ontology engineering for the Semantic Web. In: Gogolla, M., Kobryn, C. (eds.) UML 2001. LNCS, vol. 2185, pp. 342–360. Springer, Heidelberg (2001)
Bertolazzi, P., Krusisch, C., Missikoff, M.: An approach to the definition of a core enterprise ontology: CEO. In: Int. Workshop on Open Enterprise Solutions: Systems, Experiences, and Organizations (OES-SEO 2001), Rome, pp. 14–15 (2001)
Bianchini, D., De Antonellis, V., Melchiori, M.: Ontology-based semantic infrastructure for service interoperability for interorganizational applications. In: Missikoff, M. (ed.) Proc. of the Open InterOp Workshop on Enterprise Modelling and Ontologies for Interoperability, Riga, Latvia (2004)
Booch, G., Rumbaugh, J., Jacobson, I.: The Unified Modeling Language – User Guide. Addison-Wesley, Reading (1999)
Bratman, M.: Intentions, plans, and practical reason. Harvard University Press, Cambridge (1987)
Burton-Jones, A., et al.: A semiotic metric suite for assessing the quality of ontologies. Data & Knowledge Engineering 55(1), 84–102 (2005)
Cleland, D., King, W.: Management: a systems approach. McGraw-Hill, New York (1972)
Cranefield, S., Purvis, M.: UML as an ontology modeling language. In: Proc. of the Workshop on Intelligent Information Integration (1999)
Engeström, Y.: Learning by expanding: an activity theoretical approach to developmental research. Orienta-Konsultit, Helsinki (1987)
Fernandez-Lopez, M., et al.: Building a chemical ontology using METONTOLOGY and the ontology design environment. IEEE Intelligent Systems & Theory Applications 4(1), 37–46 (1999)
Fillmore, C.: The case for case. In: Bach, E., Harms, R.T. (eds.) Universals in Linguistic Theory, pp. 1–88. Holt, Rinehart and Winston, New York (1968)
Fox, M.: The TOVE Project: A common-sense model of the enterprise. In: Belli, F., Radermacher, F.J. (eds.) IEA/AIE 1992. LNCS, vol. 604, pp. 25–34. Springer, Heidelberg (1992)
Fox, M.S., Gruninger, M.: Enterprise modeling. AI Magazine 19(3), 109–121 (1998)
Geert, G., McCarthy, W.: The ontological foundations of REA enterprise information systems (2000), http://www.msu.edu/user/mccarh4/rea-ontology/
Gordijn, J.: Value-based requirements engineering – Exploring innovative e-commerce ideas. Dissertation Thesis, Vrije University, Amsterdam (2002)
Gruber, T.: A translation approach to portable ontology specification. Knowledge Acquisition 5(2), 119–220 (1993)
Gruber, T.: Towards principles for the design of ontologies used for knowledge sharing. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies 43(5/6), 907–928 (1995)
Guarino, N.: Formal ontology and information systems. In: Guarino, N. (ed.) Proc. of Conf. on Formal Ontology in Information Systems (FOIS’98), pp. 3–15. IOS Press, Amsterdam (1998)
Herbst, H.: A meta-model for business rules in systems analysis. In: Iivari, J., Rossi, M., Lyytinen, K. (eds.) CAiSE 1995. LNCS, vol. 932, pp. 186–199. Springer, Heidelberg (1995)
Jayaratna, N.: Understanding and evaluating methodologies: NIMSAD – a systemic framework. McGraw-Hill, London (1994)
Johnson, G., Scholes, K., Sexty, R.W.: Exploring strategic management. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs (1989)
Katz, R.: Toward a unified framework for version modeling in engineering databases. ACM Computing Surveys 22(4), 375–408 (1990)
Kavakli, V., Loucopoulos, P.: Goal-driven business process analysis application in electricity deregulation. Information Systems 24(3), 187–207 (1999)
Koubarakis, M., Plexousakis, D.: A formal model for business process modeling and design. In: Wangler, B., Bergman, L.D. (eds.) CAiSE 2000. LNCS, vol. 1789, pp. 142–156. Springer, Heidelberg (2000)
Lee, R.: Epistemological aspects of knowledge-based decision support systems. In: Sol, H. (ed.) Proc. of Int. Conf. on Processes and Tools for Decision Support Systems, pp. 25–36. Elsevier, Amsterdam (1983)
Leppänen, M.: Conceptual evaluation of methods for engineering situational ISD methods. Software Process: Improvement and Practice 11(5), 539–555 (2006)
Leppänen, M.: A contextual method integration. In: Magyar, G., et al. (eds.) Advances in Information Systems Development: New Methods and Practice for the Networked Society, vol. 2, Springer, Heidelberg (2007)
Leppänen, M.: Towards an ontology for information systems development – A contextual approach. In: Siau, K. (ed.) Contemporary Issues in Database Design and Information Systems Development. Idea Group Inc. (in print) (2007)
Levinson, S.: Pragmatics. Cambridge University Press, London (1983)
Lin, C.-Y., Ho, C.-S.: Generating domain-specific methodical knowledge for requirements analysis based on methodology ontology. Information Sciences 14(1-4), 127–164 (1999)
Liu, L., Yu, E.: Designing web-based systems in social context: a goal and scenario based approach. In: Pidduck, A.B., et al. (eds.) CAiSE 2002. LNCS, vol. 2348, pp. 37–51. Springer, Heidelberg (2002)
Loucopoulos, P., et al.: Using the EKD approach: the modelling component. ELEKTRA – Project No. 22927, ESPRIT Programme 7.1 (1998)
Magretta, J.: Why business models matter. Harvard Business Review 80(5), 86–92 (2002)
McCarthy, W.E.: The REA Accounting model: A generalized framework for accounting systems in a shared data environment. The Accounting Review 58(3), 554–578 (1982)
Mesarovic, M., Macko, D., Takahara, Y.: Theory of hierarchical, multilevel, systems. Academic Press, New York (1970)
NATURE Team: Defining visions in context: models, processes and tools for requirements engineering. Information Systems 21(6), 515–547 (1996)
Osterwalder, A.: The Business Model Ontology - A proposition in a design science approach. Dissertation Thesis 173, University of Lausanne, Switzerland (2004)
Padgham, L., Taylor, G.: A system for modeling agents having emotion and personality. In: Cavedon, L., Wobcke, W., Rao, A. (eds.) PRICAI-WS 1996. LNCS, vol. 1209, pp. 59–71. Springer, Heidelberg (1997)
Ramesh, R., Whinston, A.: Claims, arguments, and decisions: formalism for representation, gaming, and coordination. Information Systems Research 5(3), 294–325 (1994)
Searle, J., Vanderveken, D.: Foundations of illocutionary logic. Cambridge University Press, New York (1985)
Simon, H.: The new science of management decisions. Harper & Row, New York (1960)
Sisk, H.: Management and organization. International Business and Management Series. South Western Pub. Co., Cincinnati (1973)
Stamper, R.: Information science for systems analysis. In: Mumford, E., Sackman, H. (eds.) Human Choice and Computers, pp. 107–120. Elsevier Science Pub., Amsterdam (1975)
Uschold, M.: Building ontologies: towards a unified methodology. In: Proc. of 16th Annual Conf. of the British Computer Society Specialist Group on Expert Systems, Cambridge, UK (1996)
Uschold, M., King, M.: Towards a methodology for building ontologies. In: Workshop on Basic Ontological Issues in Knowledge Sharing, held in conjunction with IJCAI’95, Montreal, Canada (1995)
Uschold, M., et al.: The Enterprise Ontology. The Knowledge Engineer Review 13(1), 31–89 (1998)
Wang, X., Chan, C.: Ontology modeling using UML. In: Wang, Y., Patel, S., Johnston, R. (eds.) Proc. of the 7th Int. Conf. on Object-Oriented Information Systems (OOIS’2001), pp. 59–70. Springer, Berlin (2001)
Webster: Webster’s Encyclopedic Unabridged Dictionary of the English Language. Gramercy Books, New York (1989)
Weick, K.E.: Sensemaking in organizations. Sage Publications, Thousand Oaks (1995)
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Editor information
Rights and permissions
Copyright information
© 2007 Springer Berlin Heidelberg
About this paper
Cite this paper
Leppänen, M. (2007). A Context-Based Enterprise Ontology. In: Abramowicz, W. (eds) Business Information Systems. BIS 2007. Lecture Notes in Computer Science, vol 4439. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-72035-5_21
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-540-72035-5_21
Publisher Name: Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg
Print ISBN: 978-3-540-72034-8
Online ISBN: 978-3-540-72035-5
eBook Packages: Computer ScienceComputer Science (R0)