chat-transcript_20091105c_unedited.txt VNC2: Welcome to the OntologySummit2010 (Pre-launch) Community Input and Planning Session - Thu 2009-11-05 * Topic: Refining the ideas around the challenge of OntologySummit2010: "Creating the Ontologists of the Future" * Co-chair: Dr. SteveRay & Professor BarrySmith * Agenda: This is a (pre-launch) communitywide brainstorming and planning session for OntologySummit2010. Please refer to details on the session page at: http://ontolog.cim3.net/cgi-bin/wiki.pl?ConferenceCall_2009_11_05 . anonymous morphed into BettinaSchimanski anonymous morphed into KurtConrad anonymous morphed into ArturoSanchez anonymous1 morphed into Antony Galton anonymous morphed into Jeff Abbott anonymous1 morphed into BarrySmith anonymous morphed into FabianNeuhaus anonymous morphed into Rex Brooks ArturoSanchez: I heard that FrankChum: yes TerryLongstreth: @barry: is this an extension of computer application development? What are the pre-reqs? SteveRay: My apologies, somewhere along the line my phone went dead. I am now back on line. SteveRay: I don't know when I was dropped. Anyone know which slide I was on? DougHolmes: you had finished SteveRay: @Doug: Thanks, that's a relief. I thought I had given the whole talk to an inanimate machine. PeterYim: @Barry - can one get properly "trained" on OWL 2.0, say, in *one day* ? DougHolmes: re Auturo's comment, you were probably live a little longer than you thought.. PeterYim: or "ontology mapping" or even "logic for ontologists" ... you would probably need a whole bunch of prerequisites to make the "one day" plan SteveRay: @Doug - oops. ToddSchneider: Barry, why is university accreditation? SteveRay: @Todd: Eh? ToddSchneider: Barry, why is university accreditation needed? Are there other organizations that could do this? ToddSchneider: How about the Open Group? They provide administrative services. FrankChum: @Todd, to guaranty of a certain standard? SteveRay: I'm thinking that assembling a curriculum comes first, then certification comes afterwards. ToddSchneider: Barry, how were these costs arrived at? ToddSchneider: Steve, I agree: The curriculum could be compressed to the certification. I talked with Barry about this approach. SteveRay: @Todd: What do you mean, "compressed to the certification"? BettinaSchimanski: How would this certification compare to other certifications that already exist, like from Semsphere? ToddSchneider: Steve, I'm assuming a curriculum would be more comprehensive and a certification would be a subset of it. BettinaSchimanski: FYI... http://www.semsphere.com/ ToddSchneider: The notion to be addressed is interoperability in the broader sense. ArturoSanchez: Ontology creation and ontology use are tighly coupled ... PeterYim: * do we *really* need "ontologists"? ... is it a profession, or a role tagged onto some exisiting professionals ** what is an "Ontologists" anyway? How many types of "ontologists" are there? ** maybe what we need are knowledge-engineers-plus, or software-engineers-plus, or systemn-architects-plus (plus meaning those people with some additional training) PeterYim: * Marketing questions - ** who needs "ontologists"? ** how big is the "market" for (various types of) ontologists? ... now, and in 1,3,5 years? ** how are we expecting "ontologists" to be showing up as? *** bring them in-house, as part of the software team? *** go to a university, and support their professors and research students to get the work done? *** hire an independent consultant? *** go to an established "professional services" firm that has the expertise to offer? ** assuming you were the hiring manager ... how much are you willing to pay for the expertise? DougHolmes: So, in what significant way is an "ontologist" different from a knowledge engineer? There are courses of instruction that exist in that area that might be leveraged... anonymous morphed into PavithraKenjige PeterYim: ArturoSanchez expressed interest to support in an "environmental scan" on the issue at hand ToddSchneider: Ontology development paradigms are more aligned with systems engineering. PeterYim: we can do an online survey (like we did in OntologySummit2007) ... join AntonyGalton et al. in their IAOA effort? BettinaSchimanski: I agree that designing and building ontologies does not solely rely on Computer Scientists. They are the ones to implement them. The content, however, must come from SMEs, and not just from biologists as was just mentioned. PeterYim: I got a proposal (from someone who has been watching how we were doing the past summits) suggesting that we should have "proposals" prepared as part of the summit deliverables ... that would take us one more step, beyond just releasing a communique. Rex Brooks: What kind of proposal did this person mean, Peter? AmandaVizedom: @Peter: I like the proposal to prepare proposals very much. I'd like to suggest that this, too, be modular in that we will have an easier time working through proposals if those focusing on overall architecture are separate from those focusing on content segments, audience, requirements, etc. ToddSchneider: Ontology Works and top Quadrant already provide training services, among others. Could we get them to cooperate? BettinaSchimanski: I would like to clarify a previous comment of mine - I did not mention Semsphere for any marketing reasons as I am not affiliated in any way with this company. I just mentioned it as an example of another company that also has provided certification possibilities. SteveRay: @Todd: I was just talking to Ralph Hodgson of TopQuadrant about this yesterday, and he did have some suggestions, so I'd say yes, I believe they would participate. FrankChum: SemanticArts also provide a 5-day ontology design training course BettinaSchimanski: @Todd: I know TopQuadrant has been very open with training at conferences so I would think, if invited, they might be interested. I am unfamiliar with Ontology Works. AmandaVizedom: If we want to produce a truly usable and meaningful certification, we need to make sure we are addressing, in both content and presentation, the broad range of very different practices that come under the heading of Ontology. BettinaSchimanski: @Frank: I am also aware of this Semantic Arts course and have good things about it. FrankChum: @Bettina: The course has been taught by Dave McComb and his staff. I took it a few years ago. It was really good. PeterYim: @Rex - that person was referring to grant proposals BettinaSchimanski: Star 3 isn't working for the phone Rex Brooks: Thanks for the clarification. Would this be proposals in response to RFPs, or unsolicited in terms of target area? BettinaSchimanski: How do I unmute myself please? ArturoSanchez: Do you have a mute button as well? ArturoSanchez: *3 BettinaSchimanski: Yes but I have not muted myself. DougHolmes: *3 BettinaSchimanski: For some reason that isn't working ArturoSanchez: Maybe call again? ArturoSanchez: nevermind ... ArturoSanchez: Wierd! AmandaVizedom: ... I don't mean the bad stuff, obviously. I do mean that we need to consider that some ontologists are focused on creating a single-viewed best possible model of some part of the world, in abstraction from any particular user community or context. Some are explicitly focused on creating a model of the world as conceptualized by members of some community of practice. Some work within a domain and some work across domains. FrankChum: We may need to certify the trainers first! ArturoSanchez: yes AmandaVizedom: It is absolutely critical that new ontologists have some understanding of what practices they part of, and be able to distill and understand methodological guidances in that context. ArturoSanchez: So, that is another thread of discussion. What does ONTOLOG think BettinaSchimanski: Thanks all for your help to unmute. I needed to press 3* instead. ArturoSanchez: a good certificate program should look like ... ArturoSanchez: Wow, good ear! Jeff Abbott: I'm trying both *3 and 3*. ArturoSanchez: try *3* SteveRay: @Jeff - I'll let you speak next (assuming we can get it working). Jeff Abbott: thx. FrankChum: a sequence of *3 can become 3* ArturoSanchez: Yes, that's ontology mapping SteveRay: @Peter: Perhaps you could try manually unmuting Jeff Abbot from your end? LeoObrst: I was going to mention the IAOA too, as a potential certifier of the certification programs, to provide trustworthiness. FrankChum: There is a class of people out there building database/xml schemas and convert them into ontologies and then call themselves ontologists SteveRay: @Leo - that might be a better legal entity to do the certification of the certifiers than Ontolog. PeterYim: @Jeff ... can you provide me with your area code and last four digits of your phone number, please? (so that I can know which line to unmute) ArturoSanchez: Legal issues aside, ONTOLOG--as part of this upcoming summit-- BettinaSchimanski: @Frank: That is another possibility for a module topic. I do not have a background with database work but often when I work with others who have, they want to know what benefits ontologies offer that databases cannot provide. It is not often a straightforward discussion. DougHolmes: There is a joint initiative between MIT and the University of Southampton in England called The Web Science Research Initiative (WSRI) that probably ought to be part of this summit... ArturoSanchez: propose a formal curriculum that would define what an ontologist is ... BettinaSchimanski: @Doug: On that same note, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute has two key Semantic Technologists (Jim Hendler and Deb McGuinness) who have developed a curriculum that should perhaps also be considered for inclusion in ths summit. FrankChum: @Bettina: Yep. Explaining ontology concept to database people can turn into lengthy discussions. AmandaVizedom: Suggestion: replace current module 13 (UCore) with a module that surveys the landscape of existing, in-use ontologies: where they come from, what there characteristics (logically, in use, etc.) are, what they can and should be used for, how to find and assess more. DougHolmes: @Bettina I think it be very good to have Jim as part of this Summit PavithraKenjige: Steve : I beleive to build Ontology one needs to understand, logic of relationships of things, how they can be described ( properties) in ones domain. I am not sure where exactly the phsycology fits in! However, people with phycology communicate with people well, not necessarily things.. ArturoSanchez: @Bettina: Deborah McGuiness is an habitue of the summit ... it would be great to have James Hendler as well ... FrankChum: @Bettina: Yes, but both of them are computer scientist and sometimes they are not the ideal people to do ontology modeling. PeterYim: @Bettina - I did speak to Deb McGuinness last week, and has her support for this upcoming Summit DougHolmes: Thanks Ken; I have a very hard time distinguishing what we seem to be talking about from knowledge engineering... BettinaSchimanski: Great, I'm glad to hear Deb is already aware of the summit and will be a part of it. I'm sure therefore that Jim knows about it as well. I also agree that more than a Computer Science presence needs to be there. Any suggestions? MikeBennett: There are also a bunch of people at Brunel who are working in the ontology area. Might be worth talking to them? ArturoSanchez: @FrankChum: "sometimes they are not the ideal people to do ontology modeling." **this puzzles me ... can you elaborate? Jeff Abbott: Peter and group, I just wanted to put down my input in text, in case I don't get may audio working. We come from a Human Systems Integration (HSI)perspective. We have the first HSI certification program in the USA online at UCSD in San Diego, that is supported by UCSD and SPAWAR. We always do an Analysis of Alternative (AOA), see what's out there before we proceed as part of our process. We are currently developing a HSI for the System Engineer course. Peter, I just got back from the W3C and attended the HCLS Healthcare group (where I also talked with Mark Musen) and the Healthcare group certainly uses ontologies and deals with the integration of ontologies, which could be a course by itself. BettinaSchimanski: When I (a Computer Scientist) have designed ontologies, I have often partnered with a Technical Librarian. That is what made it successful in my opinion. PeterYim: @MikeBennett and all - can you, or anyone here, identify who these people are ... and/or talk to them on behalf of this community LeoObrst: I periodically teach a series of 3 courses through our MITRE Institute, each 8 hrs long: 1) Introduction to semantics, ontologies, knowledge representation, and Semantic Web technologies; 2) a more foundational course, Introduction to Logic and Logic Programming (this really should be taught first, in my opinion); and 3) an advanced course on Ontology Engineering and Applications of Ontologies. These are currently scheduled independently, but I am considering teaching them in sequence in one week. I've found these are too short at 8 hrs each, and yet that is all people can allocate time for, at least here, i.e., maximally 24 hrs over 3 days. AmandaVizedom: Indeed, RPI is another frequent producer of nascent ontologists, as is UMD. RPI seems to be coming out of CS. There are many strong ontologists working today who came originally from Philosophy, Linguistics, Information Sciences, and so forth. To be usable by folks who want to hire ontologists, the certificate may incorporate elements that originated in all of these and more, but the focus must be not on theoretical background for its own sake, but on the actual knowledge and skill needed to do good work as a working ontologist. DougHolmes: I personally think that even a small step away from computer science leads immediately and inevitably to philosophy and there is no bottom to that swamp... FrankChum: @Auturo: As Bettina mentioned, with Librarian, also social scientist, domain knowledge engineers. PeterYim: @Amanda - I talk to TimFinin (UMD) at ISWC, and he is very supportive too! BettinaSchimanski: Maybe it helps too that my background is in Artificial Intelligence/Cognitive Science. BettinaSchimanski: I think those fields might need to be included as well. FrankChum: Philosopher too. ArturoSanchez: @FrankChum: strongly agree ... the ontology is the collaborative product of modelers and--so-called--domain experts ... AmandaVizedom: @Doug: That's only true of bad philosophy. (half-joking, bc I'm not sure exactly what you mean, but serious in saying that while some critical elements come from philosophy, including conceptual analysis, applied ontology (as opposed to the philosophical subfield of ontology) is distinct from that ancestral home in part because it does *not* include unconstrained swamp-diving, except when done badly. PeterYim: @Antony and All - please document the salient points you just talked about on this chat board, if you please (that will help tremendously when I start boiling the input down to a work plan, and to manage follow-up activities) BettinaSchimanski: @All: I enjoyed this discussion and look forward to further ones. Unfortunately I need to leave now for another meeting. Have a good day! Jeff Abbott: Yes, System Engineering. We are doing the HSI to SE (because it's in one of our domains) and would like to do Ontology to SE. DougHolmes: @Amanda no slight intended to philosophers or Philosophy; it just takes a very long time to resolve anything in that realm SteveRay: @Bettina - thanks for your participation. PavithraKenjige: Jeff, I agree with that. I learnt it when I was studying software systems engineering.. BettinaSchimanski: @Steve and Barry - thank you for your presentations and proposals. FrankChum: http://videolectures.net/Top/Computer_Science/Semantic_Web/Ontologies/ Jeff Abbott: Pavith and group, you have to develop curriculum to the audience and it's logic and level of ability and need. MikeBennett: @Peter: will do. The person to talk to at Brunel is Sergio de Cesare, I'll drop him a mail and copy you. LeoObrst: @Todd: I taught an elective course on my topic 1 to UVA's Accelerated Masters program in Systems Engineering. Antony Galton: Just to put on written record what I was saying. The IAOA include educational matters as an important part of its activities. One thing we want to do is to compile a database of what is already out there, i.e., existing courses or modules with ontological content, much along the lines of what Arturo suggested, and I have already started work on this - but so far I mainly only have material from the UK. Another idea is to create a library of resources that teachers can draw on when designing courses, e.g., research papers, tutorial material, example ontologies in various formats, editing tools, etc. A third idea is to put together a set of recommendations for a set of "standard" curricula. This could relate to the idea that was mentioned about IAOA being a possible certification or accreditation body for ontological courses. Finally, I drew attention to the workshop we are planning to hold at FOIS 2010 on ontology education - we will need to look at how we can coordinate this with the activities of this summit. I'll be distributing a call for contributions for this workshop soon. PeterYim: @MikeBennett - great! thanks FrankChum: @Doug: Barry Smith was (or still is) a philosopher' Jeff Abbott: You need a ontology basis to go between domains and get a System of Systems view. MikeBennett: @Doug: I disagree profoundly. Ontology should be multi-disciplinary (think santa Fe type of approach). It has philosopical underpinnings if it's done right. IT/comp sci does not, if it's done wrong ArturoSanchez: @Antony Galton: great ideas! I'll look into the FOIS workshop you mentioned ... AmandaVizedom: @Arturo, @Frank: Yes, this is a critical point of difference between contemporary applied ontologists due and both some theoretical ontology (in philosophy) and some historical projects: By far the majority of projects are collaborative in many ways, including between ontological specialists and subject matter experts. Many people who have theoretical training turn out to be unable to do applied ontology in such contexts. Also, a dismaying number of both supposedly-trained ontologists and customers are unaware of the substantial research that has taken place in the last 20 years -- especially the last 10 -- around these collaborations and the consequences of moving the input/formalization closer to, or further away from, the SMEs. PeterYim: ToddSchneider suggested that BarrySmith might come up with an ontology on the domain of "education and training of ontologists" ToddSchneider: So Barry, are you suggesting a department of ontology would focus on research in the domain of ontology? DougHolmes: @Mike I think that a multi-disciplinary perspective is good - probably essential, but I also think there is an essential engineering perspective that has to be grounded in a particular product. That is, as far as I can see, a computer science product... MikeBennett: @Doug, it is certainly engineering and should be grounded in well established engineering methodology. This is what I don't tend to see when IT folks who call themselves engineers, get hold of a new toy or a new language to learn. Results can be variable! AmandaVizedom: @Doug: None taken! Just piping up because sometimes people focus on the more abstracted or least empirically connected schools, within certain subareas of philosophy, thinking that's all there is. There are, however, a substantial number of us out here with Ph.D.s in philosophy *and* many years of experience as working, applied ontologists in non-academic environments. We do, however, tend to come from more pragmatic schools of thought, and often from different sub-areas within philosophy. DougHolmes: @Mike can't argue with that MikeBennett: @Doug and Amanda, I think we have a core module here FrankChum: @Amanda: Philosophers can be working ontologists too. DougHolmes: @Frank as long as its ontology with a "small o" ArturoSanchez: @MichaelGruninger: good summary ... which sums up the threads that can be defined for the summit ... Jeff Abbott: Peter, I will send you my information and will be in contact. thx PeterYim: we need "champions!" Rex Brooks: I didn't want to inject a tangent, but I wish I had some ontology students to help with doing ontologies for use in IT standards. PeterYim: @Jeff - yes ... thanks ArturoSanchez: "we don't need another hero" "Tina Turner" PeterYim: I have no further comment AmandaVizedom: @Doug, @ Mike, and others: I agree that the engineering aspect is critical. In fact, I might argue that the certificate client organizations want is very importantly an *applied* ontology certificate. I have seen too many people hire folks with theoretical training only, and no engineering understanding or intuitions. This causes project failure *and* gives the field a bad reputation. ArturoSanchez: Thanks y'all Nice weather here in NE Florida AmandaVizedom: @Peter: is the chat itself captured? AmandaVizedom: @Peter: nevermind! PeterYim: Great session ... I'll try to get the chat-transcript and audio recording posted (onto the session page) within the next working day ... please check back! MikeBennett: @Amanda agree wholeheartdly. Maybe we should be talking to engineering insstitutions DougHolmes: IEEE PeterYim: session adjourned 12:03pm PST TerryLongstreth: @Peter: Could you put together a list of things people could help on? RaviSharma: Steve thanks Ravi LeoObrst: I agree with Fabian, that we need to distinguish between university (Masters level) curricula, and a professional curricula. I personally think that they are the same. I would advocate a commmon curriculum, which could be taught in 3 ways: 1)a university academic MS degree in ontology engineering, which could be prelude to a PhD program; 2) a university terminal professional MS degree in ontology engineering; 3) a non-university professional accreditation course. In all cases, there should be recognition via a certification: the first 2 via a university degree, the 3rd via the course provider backed by accreditation itself via a professional organization such as the International Association for Ontology and its Applications. PeterYim: @Terry ... I guess that would be what the "organizing committee" will need to get to next - before the OntologySummit2010 "Launch Event" on 10-Dec-2009 RaviSharma: Amanda RaviSharma: How are you? PeterYim: By everyone ... closing chat session now! =ppy