Ontology Development
• Ontology Engineering
• Step-By-Step: Developing an ontology
• Examples of Developing an ontology
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 1
Ontology Engineering
It is a methodology issues that is applied in building
ontologies, manually, reusing ontologies, and using semi-
automatic methods
determine consider enumerate define define define create
scope reuse terms classes properties constraints instances
Constructing Ontologies main stages:
1. Determine scope
2. Enumerate terms
3. Define concepts/taxonomy
4. Define properties
5. Define facets
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 2
How to build an ontology?
• Steps:
– determine domain and scope
– enumerate important terms
– define classes and class hierarchies
– define slots
– define slot restrictions (cardinality, value-type)
» Slot-cardinality
• Ex: Borders_with multiple, Start_point single
» Slot-value type
• Ex: Borders_with- Country
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 3
Step 1: Determine Domain and Scope
Domain: geography
Application: route planning agent
Possible questions:
Distance between two cities?
What sort of connections exist between two cities?
In which country is a city?
How many borders are crossed?
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 4
Step 2: Enumerate Important Terms
city capital
Connection_on_land
country
border
road
railway
Connection_on_water
currency Connection_in_air
connection
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 5
Step 3: Define Classes and Class Hierarchy
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 6
Step 4: Define Slots of Classes
Geographic_entity End_point
Connection
Country Has_capital City Start_point
Borders_with Capital_of
Capital_city
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 7
Step 5: Define slot constraints
• Constraints are Background knowledge on the
domain
– Adult_Elephants weigh at least 2,000 kg
– All Elephants are either African_Elephants or
Indian_Elephants
– No individual can be both a Herbivore and a Carnivore
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 8
Ontology Main Elements
• Defining terms in the domain and relations among
them
– Defining concepts in the domain (classes).
– Arranging the concepts in a hierarchy (subclass-
superclass hierarchy).
– Defining which attributes and properties (slots)
classes can have and constraints on their values.
• Property restrictions (type, cardinality, domain …)
- Relations between concepts (disjoint, equality …)
– Defining instance (individuals)and filling in slot values.
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 9
Ontology Components: Classes
• Classes are used to group things together.
• In most representations, members of classes must
be individuals.
• In more expressive representations, classes may
be also be allowed to be members of other
classes.
• Classes can be subsumed by, or can subsume
other classes ⇒ subclasses and superclasses.
• This leads to the class hierarchy, which is central
to most ontologies.
• Some ontologies consist only of a class hierarchy
– these are called taxonomy
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 10
Ontology Components: Individuals
• Individuals are instances or objects
• These are usually concrete
(e.g. uk_prime_minister, FCI_student_1389203)
• They can be abstract (e.g. numbers and words)
• Two individuals may be equivalent
(e.g. uk_prime_minister, Boris Johnson)
• It is not always clear whether something ought to
be an individual or a class
(e.g.uk_prime_minister)
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 11
Ontology Components: Attributes
• Attributes are aspects, properties, features,
characteristics, or parameters that objects and
classes can have.
• Attributes can link objects and classes to:
– Specific values (integers, individuals or other literals)
– Complex data types (e.g. enumerated lists)
– Boolean values (true/false)
– Other Classes
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 12
Ontology Components: Relations
• Relations describe how classes/individual relate to one
another.
• Typically, relations are defined between classes, and
instantiations of relations are between individuals.
– course(Course_Name, instructor, Level, Credits, Year)
– course(CS-SW, Abeer, 4, 3, 2021/2022)
• More restricted representations may limit this, e.g.
only allow binary relations.
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 13
EXAMPLES OF DEVELOPING AN
ONTOLOGY
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 14
Example1: animals ontology
• Purpose & scope:
• To provide an ontology for an index of a children’s
book of animals including
– Where they live
– What they eat
• Carnivores, herbivores and omnivores
– How dangerous they are
– How big they are
– A bit of basic anatomy
• numbers of legs, wings, toes, etc.
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 15
Example1: Animals & Plants
1-Collect the concepts
• Dog • Carnivore • Dangerous
• Cat • Plant • Pet
• Cow • Animal • Domestic Animal
• Person • Fur • Farm animal
• Tree • Food animal
• Child
• Grass • Fish
• Parent
• Herbivore • Carp
• Mother
• Male • Goldfish
• Female • Father
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 16
Example: Animals & Plants
Ontology Development
1-Organise the concepts
• Dog • Carnivore • Healthy
• Cat • Plant • Pet
• Cow • Animal • Domestic Animal
• Person • Fur • Farm animal
• Tree • Child • Draft animal
• Grass • Parent • Food animal
• Herbivore • Mother • Fish
• Male • Carp
• Father
• Female • Goldfish
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 17
Ontology Development (cont.)
2-Organize the concepts “Laddering”
• Add abstractions where needed
e.g. “Living thing”
• Take a group of things and ask what they have in common
– Then what other ‘siblings’ there might be
• e.g.
– Plant, Animal → Living Thing
• Might add Bacteria and Fungi but not now (scalability)
– Cat, Dog, Cow, Person → Mammal
• Others might be Goat, Sheep, Horse, Rabbit,…
– Cow, Goat, Sheep, Horse → Hoofed animal
• What others are there? Do they divide amongst themselves?
– Wild, Domestic → Domestication
Vocabulary note:
“Sibling” = “brother or sister”
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 18
Ontology Development (cont.)
Define:Self_standing_entities(concepts)
• Self-standing things vs. Modifiers
• Things that can exist on there own nouns
– People, animals, houses, actions, processes, …
• Roughly nouns
• Modifiers-
• Things that modify (“inhere”) in other things
– (e.g., wild/domestic, male/female, healthy/sick,
dangerous/safe)
• Roughly adjectives and adverbs
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 19
Ontology Development (cont.)
Identify definable things, and modifiers
Arrange Concepts/Properties into Hierarchy
• Living Thing
– Animal
• Mammal
– Cat
– Dog
– Cow
– Person
• Fish
– Carp
– Goldfish
– Plant
• Tree
• Grass
• Fruit
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 20
Define Property
• A property is a descriptions of self-standing things
• Identify the domain and range constraints for
properties
• Animal eats LivingThing:
– domain: Animal range: LivingThing
• Person owns LivingThing except Person
– domain: Person range: LivingThing and not Person
• Animal parentOf Animal
– domain: Animal range: Animal
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 21
Ontology Development (cont.)
• Identify relations
– e.g. “eats”, “owns”, “parent of”
• Identify definable things
– e.g. “child”, “parent”, “Mother”, “Father”
• Things where you can say clearly what it means
– (Father, Herbivore, etc)
– Try to define a dog precisely – very difficult
» A “natural kind”
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 22
Definable things
• “A Parent is an Animal that is a parent of some
other Animal”
Parent ≡ Animal u ∃parentOf.Animal
• A Herbivore is an Animal that eats only Plants”
(NB: all Animals eat some LivingThings)
Herbivore ≡ Animal u ∀eats.Plant
• “An Omnivore is an Animal that eats both
Plants and Animals”
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 23
Ontology Development (cont.)
Reorganise everything but “definable” things into pure trees
• Living Thing ◼ Relations
– Animal ◼ eats
• Mammal
◼ owns
– Cat
– Dog ◼ parent-of
– Cow ◼ …
– Person
◼ Definable
• Fish
– Carp
◼ Carnivore
– Goldfish ◼ Herbivore
– Plant ◼ Child
• Tree ◼ Parent
• Grass ◼ Mother
• Fruit ◼ Father
◼ Food Animal
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 24
Ontology Development (cont.)
Modifiers
• Identify modifiers that have mutually exclusive values
(Domestication, Dangerousness, Gender, Age)
• Not mutually exclusive usage.
– (can be both Draught and Food)
• There are two ways of specifying values for modifiers
❖ value partitions (classes that partition a quality .e.g child-
adult)
❖ value sets (individuals that enumerate all states of a
quality e.g. Dangerousness: Dangerous, Risky, Safe)
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 25
Ontology Development (cont.)
Reorganise everything but “definable” things into pure trees
• Living Thing • Modifiers
– domestic ◼ Relations
– Animal ◼ eats
• pet
• Mammal • Farmed ◼ owns
– Cat – Draft
– Dog – Food ◼ parent-of
– Cow • Wild ◼ …
– Person – Health ◼ Definable
• Fish • healthy
– Carp
◼ Carnivore
• sick
– Goldfish ◼ Herbivore
– Gender
– Plant • Male ◼ Child
• Tree • Female ◼ Parent
• Grass – Age ◼ Mother
• Adult ◼ Father
• Fruit
• Child ◼ Food Animal
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 26
Ontology Example
2- How can we create an ontology for the
academic research domain (people, publications,
etc)?
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 27
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 28
Ontology Example (cont.)
Ontology Example
Building Ontologies (C) Copyright 2022 by Prof. Abeer El-Korany 29
