DIAGRAMMATIC KNOWLEDGE MODELING FOR MANAGERS

Ontology-based Approach

Dmitry Kudryavtsev

Intelligent Computer Technologies Dpt., Saint-Petersburg State Polytechnic University, Saint-Petersburg, Russia

Tatiana Gavrilova

Graduate School of Management, Saint-Petersburg State University, Saint-Petersburg, Russia

Keywords: Knowledge visualization, Diagram, Visual modelling language, Ontology, Ontology design pattern,

Business.

Abstract: Diagrams are an effective and popular tool for visual knowledge structuring. Managers also often use them

to acquire and transfer business knowledge. There are many currently available diagrams or visual modeling

languages for managerial needs, unfortunately the choice between them is frequently error-prone and

inconsistent. This situation raises the next questions. What diagrams/ visual modeling languages are the

most suitable for the specific type of business content? What domain-specific diagrams are the most suitable

for the visualization of the particular elements of organizational ontology? In order to provide the answers,

the paper suggests light-weight specification of diagrams and knowledge content types, which is based on

the competency questions and ontology design patterns. The proposed approach provides the classification

of qualitative business diagrams.

1 INTRODUCTION

Knowledge visualization proved to be an effective

tool for knowledge creation, acquisition and transfer

(Eisenstadt et al., 1990); (Eppler and Burkhard,

2007); (Gavrilova and Voinov, 1998). Diagrams

constitute the basis for visual knowledge

representation and elaborated diagrammatic

techniques typically form visual modeling languages

(Harel and Rumpe, 2000). The focus of this paper is

put on the realm of management. Managers also

frequently use diagrams in their work (Lengler and

Eppler, 2007), but the choice of diagrams is often

error-prone and inconsistent.

For the effective choice of the visualization

method, several perspectives should be considered

(Eppler and Burkhard, 2007). Type of content or

knowledge type is one of the perspectives and is the

focus of the paper. Any complex entity can be

represented from several aspects (facets) and at

different strata (layers) (Gavrilova and Voinov,

1998); (Zachman, 2003). The following “7W”

question-based aspects can be proposed and

differentiated (Eppler and Burkhard, 2007);

Gavrilova and Voinov, 1998); (Kipling, 1912);

(Zachman, 2003): WHAT-, WHAT_FOR-, HOW-,

WHO-, WHERE-, WHEN- and WHY-knowledge

types.

Today, there is no validated prescriptive

framework that links business diagrams with the

“7W” knowledge types and that offers specific

diagram for every knowledge type. The problem is

accentuated by the lack of knowledge types’

specifications. This defines the first research

question: What diagrams/ visual modeling

languages are the most suitable for the specific

type of knowledge (content)?

The second research question stems from the

task of ontology visualization within different

applications. Ontology is a formal, explicit

specification of a shared conceptualization.

Traditional graphical representations of ontologies

do not consider a domain specific meaning (Katifori,

et al., 2007). Special ontology-based frameworks are

developed to visualize ontology using domain-

specific notations (Karagiannis and Kühn, 2002);

(Kudryavtsev and Grigoriev, 2011). Some of these

frameworks are oriented towards managers. It

defines the second research question: What

386

Kudryavtsev D. and Gavrilova T..

DIAGRAMMATIC KNOWLEDGE MODELING FOR MANAGERS - Ontology-based Approach.

DOI: 10.5220/0003640103860389

In Proceedings of the International Conference on Knowledge Engineering and Ontology Development (KEOD-2011), pages 386-389

ISBN: 978-989-8425-80-5

 2011 SCITEPRESS (Science and Technology Publications, Lda.)

diagrams/ visual modeling languages are the most

suitable for the visualization of the particular

ontology view?

2 RELATED WORK

Periodic table of visualization methods (Lengler and

Eppler, 2007) provides a good top-level diagrams

overview for managers. Lohse et al. (Lohse et al.,

1994) reported a structural classification of visual

representations. Some of the diagramming tools,

such as Visio, Smartdraw, provide its own

classifications of the templates. Also there exist

several enterprise architecture based classifications,

e.g. Archimate (Jonkers et al., 2003), MEMO

(Frank, 2002), IBM Enterprise framework or

populated Zachman Framework. But these

classifications and frameworks do not include all the

types of diagrams used by managers and are rather

IT-oriented.

Unfortunately these classifications either are too

general, or have rather inconsistent classification

criterias, or have limited set of diagrams, which do

not cover all the “7W” knowledge types. Besides the

suggested categories are specified insufficiently, and

it is quite hard to add new diagram into the existing

classification.

3 METHODOLOGY AND

RESULTS

We suggest using ontology-based specifications for

knowledge types and diagrams. This approach will

provide opportunity to select the diagram for the

specific knowledge types, competency question and

for the visualization of the required ontology view

(elements of ontology).

To describe informally the knowledge types we

suggest to use competency questions technique

(Gómez-Pérez et al., 2008).

Ontology-based knowledge types specification

consists of a set of Ontology Design Patterns (ODP)

(Gangemi and Presutti, 2009). ODP - a modeling

solution to solve a recurrent ontology design

problem. It is a template that represents a schema for

specific design solutions (http://ontologydesign

patterns.org/). Some ODPs can be extracted from

enterprise-related ontologies, (Filipowska et al.,

2009); (Uschold et al., 1998).

Ontology-based diagram specification is based on

the ideas of (Guizzardi et al., 2006), but we suggest

to use “light-weight” specifications of only the core

diagram elements.

The following steps and their results summarize

the suggested ideas:

1. Define the knowledge types using competency

questions. The resulting informal description of the

knowledge types is represented in Figure 1 (it

includes just the main representative questions);

2. Specify the knowledge types using ODPs. The

specifications include the lists of corresponding

ODPs and their descriptions, e.g. “WHAT-

knowledge” type can be specified using “part-of”,

“classification”, “subclass” and “type” ODPs from

http://ontologydesignpatterns.org/.

3. Identify and specify diagram types, which will

*non-specific competency questions are highlighted (won’t be directly relate to ODPs)

Figure 1: Knowledge types description using competency questions.

DIAGRAMMATIC KNOWLEDGE MODELING FOR MANAGERS - Ontology-based Approach

387

potentially correspond to the suggested knowledge

types. Ontology-based specification of diagrams also

includes the list of corresponding ODPs and

competency questions.

4. Align ontology-based specifications of

knowledge types and diagrams. Example alignment

between ontology-based specifications of knowledge

type and diagram is shown in Table 1.

5. Classify diagrams according to knowledge types

based on the ODP alignment. The resulting

classification may be useful for the practitioners in

selecting the appropriate business diagram type

(Figure 2).

The research findings correspond to this 5-step

process and its results, both intermediate and final,

and are represented below.

4 SCENARIOS OF RESULTS

USAGE

The described approach allow us to sketch some

patterns of use which may enhance the effectiveness

of visual modeling. Thus we can introduce three

possible scenarios of results usage.

Scenario A. The user choose the diagrams based on

the competency questions only. These questions will

either lead to diagrams directly, or will point to the

required knowledge type with a list of associated

diagrams.

Scenario B. The advanced user may choose the

diagrams using ODPs and the competency questions

can be used for preliminary filtering.

Table 1: Example alignment between WHO-knowledge and swim-lane diagram specifications.

Knowledge type specification Diagram type specification

WHO Competency

question/-s:

Who performs

smth? (informal)

What roles are this

task (action) of?

“Role task” ODP Swim-lane diagram

Figure 2: Diagrams vs. knowledge types.

KEOD 2011 - International Conference on Knowledge Engineering and Ontology Development

388

Scenario C. The user or service wants to represent

his/her ontology using domain-specific visual

language. Then service aligns ontology, which must

be represented, with ontology-based diagrams’

specifications and then selects the appropriate

diagrams for the ontology based on the alignment.

5 DISCUSSION AND

CONCLUSIONS

The main research results of our paper are:

 Specifications for the “7W” knowledge types;

 Diagrams systematization, which is grounded on

ontological specifications. Obviously, this

classification is only the attempt as the list of

diagrams for knowledge types is incomplete.

 5-step process which makes it possible to extend

knowledge types’ specification and to classify new

diagrams based on the content perspective.

Creation of the extended catalogue/repository for

diagrams should be a collaborative effort based on

the proposed 5-step process.

The main result of our papers for final user

(manager) is the mapping between knowledge types

and popular business diagram types. Such the

mapping together with the suggested informal

descriptions of knowledge types can support

managers, while working with visual models.

The ODP-based approach can be considered as

the first step towards pure ontologically founded

usage of diagrams among managers. The ultimate

goal is the design of a consistent organizational

ontology or ontology network behind a collection of

diagrams. This will allow organizations to have

comprehensive ontology-based knowledge

repository with domain-specific visual views.

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