Ontology Support For Configurative Reference Modelling

Becker, Jörg; Fleischer, Stefan; Knackstedt, Ralf; Stein, Armin

Abstract
The manual customisation of reference models to suite special purposes is an exhaustive task that has to be accomplished thoroughly to preserve, explicit and extend the inherit intention. This can be facilitated by the usage of automatisms like those being provided by the configurative reference modelling approach. Thus, the reference model has to be enriched by data describing for which application scenario a certain element is relevant. By assigning this data to application contexts, this structure builds a taxonomy. This taxonomy can be extended by relationships between the elements, thus forming an ontology. The paper illustrates the advantage of the usage of such ontologies during three relevant phases of the lifecycle of configurative reference models. Furthermore, algorithms for the evaluation f the ontology and the deduction of the resulting effects are presented. Finally, the functional efficiency is proven by demonstrating the application of the approach using a software tool for reference modelling.

Keywords
Ontology Support; Configurative Reference Models; Tools; Model Lifecycle