Re: SUO: RE: Contrasting Starter Structural Ontology with R.Kent's formali
Graham Horn said:
> . I am keen on getting means of visualising the ontologies,
> since that vastly reduces the work involved in getting a feel for the
> structure.
>
> . Your mention of relationships makes me wonder whether what
> you are proposing lends itself to some form of entity - relationship
> modelling.
>
> . Is there any relatively convenient visualisation of what you
> are proposing, that we can view?
>
I'm afraid the visualization I think of is usually of a few limited forms.
1) coloured marbles with coloured hoops
2) coloured paperclips binding coloured worms
3) trellis of beads with different coloured beads and trellis segments
4) A file cabinet of drawers full of folders with filled-in paper forms
These are usually my set of metaphors that I use to visualize.
I don't have software to represent an ontology in these forms,
I just use that amazing creation known as my mind.
If we were to take the fact:
(INSTANCE-OF DAVID PERSON)
I would visualize this as a "(INSTANCE-OF DAVID PERSON)"
coloured paperclip binding together the "DAVID" coloured worm,
the "INSTANCE-OF" coloured worm, and the "PERSON" coloured worm.
This can also be seen as a "(INSTANCE-OF DAVID PERSON)" coloured
marble sitting in a hoop for a consistent theory which I haven't named.
Alternately, it might be a "DAVID" coloured marble sitting in a hoop
coloured with "(INSTANCE-OF ?X PERSON)", signifying all the instances
of a type named "PERSON".
Or, it might be a "PERSON" coloured marble sitting in a hoop coloured
with "(INSTANCE-OF DAVID ?C)", signifying all the types that David is
an instance of.
The trellis image would have a bead coloured "DAVID" that has a
trellis segment coloured "INSTANCE-OF" connecting it to a bead coloured
"PERSON". The Trellis image, in degenerate forms, can be drawn
as a simple tree as well.
The file cabinet image could have the file cabinet labeled with some
logical theory's name, some folder labeled with "DAVID" containg
a paper sheet with a pre-printed form with a question "INSTANCE-OF"
filled in with the answer "PERSON".
This is just a sample of how I use these visualizations.
David