Bridging the gap between the Model-Driven Architecture and ontology engineering

Abstract

This paper discusses the potential benefits to ontology engineering in making the toolset of the Object Management Group’s model-driven architecture (MDA) applicable to ontology modelling, and describes the design of an MDA-based tool to convert ontologies expressed in any language having a metamodel defined used the OMG’s MOF model to an equivalent representation in RDF but with the same metamodel. It is shown how this representation, compared to the XMI format, provides a higher level generic serialisation format for MDA models (especially ontologies) that is amenable to analysis and transformation using existing RDF tools. This helps to bridge the gap between the MDA and ontology engineering by providing a route for ontologies in various ontology modelling languages to be imported into industrial-strength MDA model repositories and other tools, and by allowing these ontologies to be transformed to and from other forms of model.