This page is intended to support the process of improving and validating the use and representation of values across FIBO. Values in this regard may be distinguished from “entities”; values are immutable and non-temporal, their identity is fully defined by their immutable content. Values includes xsd defined literals, FIBO “Business Facing Types” (BFT) and OWL classes representing values. A common abstraction and representation for value classes is defined in the ontology “Values.rdf”, however that ontology has issues that must be resolved. A process is required to make FIBO consistently follow current polices.
Factors to be considered
· Maintaining (and improving) consistency and validity across all of FIBO
· Changes impacting OMG specifications
· Changes impacting current use of FIBO
· Understandability & Simplicity
· Capture & use of stakeholder terms and concepts
· Consistency with referenced standards
· Semantic precision
· Technology and data representation independence
· Business Facing Types is now thought to be undesirable and should be deprecated
· Balancing consistency with ontologists preference
Related Issues
• FND-91
• FND-151
• FND-99
• FND-103
• FND-107
• FND-157
Current state of baseline (FIBO Master)
· There is a lack constancy across FIBO in the use and representation of FIBO values.
· The current Values.RDF redundantly defines concepts covered in established ontologies and has other issues previously documented.
· It has been established that a repaired Values.RDF should be use as the foundation for FIBO classes representing values.
· It has further been established that xsd literals and datatype properties may be used when there is insufficient semantic leverage in using value classes (noting that this is subjective)
· Existing use of BFT was mechanically changed to use Values.RDF across much of FIBO (101 Ontologies) resulting in undesirable patterns – arbitrary use of classes where literals are sufficient and failure of existing classes to subclass “Value”.
Statistics to help evaluate scope and impact
(Some are approximate – raw data is available)
· Types in Values.rdf are used 560 times across 101 ontologies
· XSD data types are used 146 times across 102 ontologies
· BFTs are used 64 times across 15 ontologies
· There are also thousands of uses of XSD types in individuals and metadata
Recommended changes
· Type substitutions as defines in the “Substitutions Page”
· Consistent use of Values as defined in the “Values Review Page”
Process summary
· Come to agreement on the changes to be made (this page). Note decisions are required for items marked “Choice”.
· Branch from “Master” and validate that it passes all tests as-is
· Ensure that CCM models are up to date with branch
· Make the substitutions detailed in the Substitution List
· Export impacted ontologies
· Review and validate Values.RDF
· Validate changes with Protégé
· Check into branch to kick-off full validation
· Inspect validation & review by FND team
· Further validate with use of individuals per Elisa’s suggestions for validation
· Check-in any modifications
· FND Team to review & modify each of the ontologies on the “Values Review Page”
· Check in and repeat validations
· Complete with pull request