Semantic Web and Ontology
Seyyed Mahdi Taheri; Elham Hooshmand; Esmat Momeni; Negin Shokrzadeh Hashtroudi; Mehdi Alipour Hafezi
Abstract
IntroductionOrganizational ontologies are a type of ontology that focuses on identifying and documenting organizational entities. These tools provide a common conceptualization of organizational entities and are utilized for representing organizational knowledge, describing organizational structures, ...
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IntroductionOrganizational ontologies are a type of ontology that focuses on identifying and documenting organizational entities. These tools provide a common conceptualization of organizational entities and are utilized for representing organizational knowledge, describing organizational structures, identifying entities, and revealing the features and relationships of entities. They also, support the dissemination of organizational data, generated reports, organizational history, human resources, and the roles of each of these through a linked data approach. Therefore, the purpose of this research was to design the business ontology of Ehya Sepahan Company based on semantic web data models.Research Question(s)In the present research, the following questions have been addressed:- What are the internal and external entities of the Ehya Sepahan Company and their attributes?- To what extent do the entities and attributes of the Ehya Sepahan Company align with the Schema.org data model?- How is the organizational ontology of the Ehya Sepahan Company structured based on the organizational ontology of the World Wide Web Consortium?Literature ReviewResearch related to ontology design can be divided into two main categories:2.1. Studies that examine the application of ontologiesThe first category includes studies that examine the application of ontologies or the design of ontologies in specific contexts. Research by Sharif (2008), Bavakhani (2015), Hassanzadeh, Kahani, and Pourmasoumi (2016), Mardpour and Dehghan-Tafti (2017), Akbari and Rajabi-Bahjat (2018), Fuchs-Kittowski and Faust (2008), Cavaliere et al. (2019), and Outa et al. (2020) fall into this category. In this context, Bavakhani (2015) explored the interrelationship between ontologies and knowledge management. Cavalier et al. (2019) designed an ontology design model for analyzing video content captured by drones in their study. The findings of the studies in this group indicate that in contemporary organizations, there is a necessity to utilize ontologies in processes related to existing knowledge. 2.2. Studies that specifically address the design of organizational ontologiesThe second category includes studies that specifically address the design of organizational ontologies for various organizations. Research by Delavari (2018), Rajabi and Alineghizadeh Ardestani (2019), Gualtieri and Rafolu (2005), Santos et al. (2013), and Elnagar et al. (2022) are included in this group. Rajabi and Alineghizadeh Ardestani (2019) presented a data-driven approach to develop an architectural model using organizational ontology. Elnagar et al. (2022) offered a framework for the automatic production of ontologies from an organizational perspective in their research.MethodologyThis study was developmental-applied research in nature and qualitative research in terms of approach, conducted using qualitative content analysis and design methods. The statistical population includes all entities of the Ehya Sepahan Company (data entities, human resources, organizational positions), as well as the classes and attributes present in the organizational ontology.The research was conducted in several sections; initially, by examining the organizational ontology, the classes and attributes needed for modeling the entities and attributes present in the Ehya Sepahan Company were identified. Subsequently, through reviewing organizational documents, the organizational structure, job descriptions, and various departments of the company, the organizational entities and the characteristics of each were identified. With the identification of the entities and main concepts of the company, the necessary classes and attributes were determined. Since the aim of this study was to design a company ontology based on a semantic web data model, alongside the main classes and attributes of its organizational ontology, standard metadata classes and attributes from the Schema.org data model were used. In this research, Observation and documentary methods and a checklist are utilized for gathering the required data.ResultsThe findings of this research revealed that the entities of Ehya Sepahan Company are divided into internal and external entities. In total, 9 main entities and 3 external entities were identified for the company’s ontology. Various attributes were provided for each of these 12 entities. A total of 152 attributes were identified for the 12 entities of the company, and these attributes were assigned to different entities. For the internal entities, 147 attributes were used, while for the external entities, 21 attributes were utilized.The findings revealed that most of the attributes considered for company entities are presented in the schema.org standard. So, all the mentioned attributes for Organization, Person, Website, and Product entities in schema.org are consistent with the attributes needed to describe the company entities. the investigation of organizational ontology showed that this ontology has 9 entities and all these entities were used to design the ontology of Ehya Sepahan company. Likewise, the results showed that there is a good alignment between the attributes of the organizational ontology and the schema.org metadata standard. DiscussionBased on the finding it could be said that the entities of the company each possess unique characteristics. Accordingly, specific attributes were considered in the organizational ontology based on the features of each of these entities to provide an accurate and appropriate description of the company and its entities. For a large number of attributes considered for the company’s entities, suitable attributes are provided in schema.org. All the attributes mentioned for organizational entities, such as person, website, and product, align with the necessary attributes needed to describe the company’s entities in schema.org. The reason for this suitable alignment between entities and the attributes of the organizational ontology and schema.org is the comprehensive perspective of schema.org as a semantic web data model for describing various types of data entities.ConclusionIn general, it can be stated that organizational ontologies are one of the efficient tools for accurate description and knowledge discovery of data entities of organizations that can be used to facilitate and speed up processes and decisions in the organization.
