6533b85ffe1ef96bd12c2484

RESEARCH PRODUCT

From Databases to Ontologies

Janis BarzdinsGuntis BarzdinsKarlis Cerans

subject

Information retrievalDatabaseComputer scienceModeling languageInformationSystems_DATABASEMANAGEMENTWeb Ontology Languagecomputer.software_genreDatabase designClosed-world assumptionOntology componentsIDEFIDEF5Open-world assumptioncomputercomputer.programming_language

description

This chapter introduces the UML profile for OWL as an essential instrument for bridging the gap between the legacy relational databases and OWL ontologies. We address one of the long-standing relational database design problems where initial conceptual model (a semantically clear domain conceptualization ontology) gets “lost” during conversion into the normalized database schema. The problem is that such “loss” makes database inaccessible for direct query by domain experts familiar with the conceptual model only. This problem can be avoided by exporting the database into RDF according to the original conceptual model (OWL ontology) and formulating semantically clear queries in SPARQL over the RDF database. Through a detailed example we show how UML/OWL profile is facilitating this new and promising approach.

yearjournalcountryeditionlanguage
2009-01-01
https://doi.org/10.4018/978-1-60566-058-5.ch145