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Overview

The IOF will provide additional artifacts as part of the ontology deliverable sub-directory addenda below the ontology topic or subtopic. This document provides the rules and naming conventions for each of the classes of addenda and their specific artifacts.

Rules, Property Chains, and Shape Constraints are not considered a normative part of the ontology and MAY be used at the implementor’s discretion. The IOF will maintain and ensure the rules pass unit tests and do not violate any logic in the ontologies. The ontologies MUST NOT be dependent on the rules to function, and therefore, rules MUST NOT be used in place of axioms.

Regarding SWRL (Semantic Web Rule Langauge): The w3c specification for SWRL is no longer supported, and therefore, it is useful but cannot be considered a normative part of the ontologies. The IOF cannot guarantee any specific implementation is compliant with the standard and our rule implementation.

The following rules MUST be followed when reviewing this document; these are taken from IETF RFC 2119 (simplified):

1. MUST: This word means that the definition is an absolute requirement of the specification.

2. MUST NOT: This phrase means that the definition is an absolute prohibition of the specification.

3. SHOULD: This word means that there may exist valid reasons in particular circumstances to ignore a particular item, but the full implications MUST be understood and carefully weighed before choosing a different course.

4. SHOULD NOT: This phrase means that there may exist valid reasons in particular circumstances when the particular behavior is acceptable or even useful, but the full implications should be understood and the case carefully weighed before implementing any behavior described with this label.

5. MAY: This word means that an item is truly optional. One vendor may choose to include the item because a particular marketplace requires it or because the vendor feels that it enhances the product while another vendor may omit the same item.

Terminology Used in This Document

• construct: class, object property, or data property

Requirements for the Non-Normative content

• Non-normative content MUST be in an addenda subdirectory under the related ontology directory in the IRI.

  • Examples:

    • /ontology/core/addenda/swrl/CoreRules

    • /ontology/core/temporal/addenda/swrl/AllensTemporalRules

    • /ontology/core/addenda/shacl/CoreShapes

    • /ontology/core/addenda/propertychain/CorePropertyChains

• The following naming rules MUST be used for the following artifacts:

  • .../addenda/swrl/ : the directory swrl MUST be used for all SWRL (Semantic Web Rule Language) files

  • .../addenda/shacl/ : the directory shacl MUST be used for all SHACL (Shape Constraint Language) files

  • .../propertychain/ : the directory propertychain MUST be used for all files containing property chains

SWRL Requirements

The following requirements apply to SWRL and the naming of the files and variables within the rule document:

• The IRI of the Rule file MUST be consistent with the location of the rule file:

  • https://spec.industrialontologies.org/core/addenda/swrl/TemporalRelationInference

• Variables MUST have meaningful names the describe their usage in the rule, such as firstName, lastName, firstInterval, lastInterval

• The variable IRI MUST use a forward slash (/) as the separator from the ontology IRI and the variable.

  • https://spec.industrialontologies.org/core/addenda/swrl/TemporalRelationInference/firstInstant1

• All required annotations referenced in IOF Annotation Property Guide V2.2 MUST be given for the ontology.

• The rdfs:label MUST be in lower camel case and briefly describe what the rule does.

• The terms:description MUST describe the purpose of the rule and its outcome.

• All SWRL rules MUST include the following descriptions to understand the meaning and purpose of the rule: iof-av:explanatoryNote or iof-av:usageNote

  • SWRL rules MUST be tested with competency questions.

  • The tests MUST state if they require SWRL rules.

  • The SWRL rules MUST be in a separate file.

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