Abstract
Information sharing among distributed obsolescence management systems is a challenge because of the heterogeneity of data (data with different forms and representations). Indeed, this is the main hurdle that exists for current tools managing product obsolescence. This paper presents a hybrid ontology approach for the integration of obsolescence information that combines a global ontology that provides a shared vocabulary for the specification of the semantics of obsolescence domain knowledge, along with local ontologies that describe structures of multiple data sources distributed in various obsolescence management tools. A procedure is provided for mapping local ontologies to the global ontology by quantifying relationships between classes and identifying groups of classes with a clustering method. Ontologies and rules of identifying relationships are realized with OWL (Web Ontology Language) and SWRL (Semantic Web Rule Language). With the application of the hybrid ontology approach, a unified view of data is provided to support decision making for efficient obsolescence management and a structure where new sources of information can be easily added with little modification in the future.
Original language | English (US) |
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Pages (from-to) | 485-499 |
Number of pages | 15 |
Journal | Computers and Industrial Engineering |
Volume | 65 |
Issue number | 3 |
DOIs | |
State | Published - Jul 2013 |
All Science Journal Classification (ASJC) codes
- General Computer Science
- General Engineering