- From: Jeff Z. Pan <jpan@csd.abdn.ac.uk>
- Date: Mon, 10 Sep 2007 11:42:35 +0100
- To: Ken Laskey <klaskey@mitre.org>
- CC: Anne Cregan <annec@cse.unsw.edu.au>, Giorgos Stoilos <gstoil@image.ece.ntua.gr>, public-xg-urw3@w3.org
Hi Ken and all, Ken Laskey wrote: > Anne, > > The intent of RIF is to avoid choosing the winner among possible rules > formats and to theoretically come up with a way of exchanging > information across formats. There was always the question of whether > one could write the interchange format without effectively writing a > new rules language. Agree. > > URW3 is modeled with the idea behind RIF in mind to see if we can > "interchange" uncertainty information without (or at least minimizing) > making things specific to an uncertainty methodology. The answer is > far from obvious. > > As for whether there can be an uncertainty dialect for RIF, our > challenge is to identify what would be in such a dialect. I hope RIF > provides a Dialect Framework to which others could develop specific > dialects. In that case, there would be less pressure on the scarce > resources of a single WG. Currently only two dialects are being developed in phase one of RIF, some others will be in the second phase of RIF (which hasn't been formally approved yet, I think). If our XG becomes a WG (or merges into a Task Force in RIF) at some point, we could formally propose an uncertainty dialect there. > > Still, the current XG will not develop a Dialect because > (1) we have yet to establish what would go into such a dialect > (2) RIF hasn't sufficiently defined a dialect framework > (3) we aren't chartered to develop a dialect (but a future group might) > > Other thoughts? Some Fuzzy RuleML folks and I have a paper about Uncertainty in RuleML [1]. In this paper, we also discuss an uncertainty dialect for RIF (Section 6). Comments are welcome. Jeff [1] Carlos Viegas Damasio, Jeff Z. Pan, Giorgos Stoilos and Umberto Straccia. *Representing Uncertainty in RuleML*. In /Fundamenta Informaticae/. To appear. 2007. Available at http://www.csd.abdn.ac.uk/~jpan/. > > Ken > > On Sep 9, 2007, at 11:39 PM, Anne Cregan wrote: > >> >> Giorgos, >> >> Thanks for that - I learnt something very important that I didn't >> realise before. >> Are others as surprised as I am that RIF is ONLY going to be an >> interchange >> format and is NOT attempting to build a language for writing Rules >> for the Semantic Web? >> >> I think that for URW3 purposes, the ability to write rules will be >> critical, so we >> should keep a close eye on this. Do we know of any working group >> taking this on? >> >> Ken and Kathy - when you attend the W3C SemWeb Coordination Group >> conference call, could you perhaps ask them what work is afoot to support >> rule writing for the (semantic) Web? >> >> I would assume whatever we deliver would need this as a vehicle. >> Would others agree? >> >> Anne >> >> >> >> >> >> >> On 08/09/2007, at 4:23 PM, Giorgos Stoilos wrote: >> >>> >>> Dear All, >>> >>> During the August 1st telecon I promised to provide some feedback to the >>> group regarding the RIF Wroking Group (WG). Since it seems that I >>> will also >>> miss some of the next telecons (both on the 19th and the 3rd it >>> seems that I >>> will be travelling) I am sending a mail with some feedback. >>> >>> ==ID== >>> - RIF stands for Rule Interchange Format. >>> - It is a Working Group (unlike our Interest Group), i.e. it will >>> provide a >>> standard (W3C Recommendation). >>> - RIF is chartered for 2 years. >>> - RIF home page: http://www.w3.org/2005/rules/ >>> - RIF Charter: http://www.w3.org/2005/rules/wg/charter.html >>> - RIF wiki page: http://www.w3.org/2005/rules/wg/wiki/FrontPage >>> >>> == Objectives == >>> RIF is the current action of W3C for the rules layer of Semantic >>> Web. The >>> primary purpose is to propose a format for interchanging rules >>> between rule >>> systems on the (Semantic) Web and *NOT* to create a W3C Rule >>> Language for >>> the Semantic Web. Thus, one should not expect to use RIF to >>> represent its >>> rules, i.e. creating a RIF Rule Base. >>> >>> RIF is also expected to provide compatibility with current W3C >>> Semantic Web >>> standards like RDF and OWL. >>> >>> == Architecture == >>> The work is split in to 2 phases: >>> In phase 1 we will defined a RIF Core language which is lets say "a >>> minimum >>> *interesting* fragment that is common over most logic programming >>> languages >>> and systems". Then in phase 2 several RIF Dialects will extend or >>> restrict >>> the semantics and functionality of RIF Core elements to create a rule >>> interchange format for an LP language not supported by RIF Core. >>> Examples of >>> RIF Dialects could be an F-Logic Dialect, a DisjunctiveDatalog >>> Dialect, a >>> Horn+Negation, a Production Rule dialect, etc. >>> >>> So if you wanted to exchange rules between your Disjunctive Datalog >>> system >>> and some other one (also a Disjunctive Datalog system) you would have to >>> implement a mapping from your rule base to the appropriate RIF >>> Dialect and >>> of course the other part should also be able to translate the RIF >>> Rules to >>> its own format. >>> >>> Maybe the group will examine some cases of exchanging rules between >>> diverse >>> systems, i.e. a RIF StableNegationToWellFoundedNegation Dialect but >>> is only >>> expected to do it for cases that such mapping has been studied in the >>> literature and not do research on its own. >>> >>> Checkout: http://www.w3.org/2005/rules/wg/wiki/Arch/Extensibility >>> >>> == So Far == >>> The group started with UseCases & Requirements and until then it has >>> produced 3 versions of them. The working version is here >>> http://www.w3.org/2005/rules/wg/wiki/UCR. >>> >>> Currently the work is focused on RIF Core >>> http://www.w3.org/TR/rif-core/, >>> its XML syntax, RDF Compatibility and build-ins. Originally RIF Core was >>> proposed to be Horn Logic + Sorts, but we have backtracked to Horn >>> http://www.w3.org/2005/rules/wg/wiki/Core. >>> >>> Regarding dialects there was some work on a NegationDialect and some >>> Prodcution Rule System dialect but I think little has been done on this >>> issue. >>> >>> == RIF and Uncertainty == >>> Since the beginning we (the NTUA-IVML group) have tried to bring up the >>> issue of uncertainty extensions of Semantic Web standards whenever >>> possible. >>> >>> >>> Initially, we succeeded in having "uncertainty" mentioned in the RIF >>> Charter >>> under the RIF Extensibility section >>> http://www.w3.org/2005/rules/wg/charter#extensibility. >>> >>> Then during the UseCases work we added a UC for Fuzzy >>> http://www.w3.org/2005/rules/wg/wiki/Fuzzy_Reasoning_with_Brain_Anatomical_S >>> tructures but it didn't made it into the UCs document. Nevertheless, we >>> tried to add it implicitly through the Medical Decision support Use Case >>> http://www.w3.org/2005/rules/wg/wiki/UCR/Ruleset_Integration_for_Medical_Dec >>> ision_Support that exists in it. >>> >>> As with the UseCases it seems that we could propose an Uncertainty >>> Dialect >>> to the RIF group. Actually together with Carlos Damasio, Jeff Pan and >>> Umberto Straccia we have already done some work for an Uncertainty RIF >>> dialect in a paper to appear in Fundamenta Informaticae. >>> >>> But on the other hand from my experience in related W3C activities I >>> would >>> say that it is unlike that such an extension will survive as a >>> dialect in >>> the final standard. Uncertainty always looks kind of exotic to most >>> people, >>> while several ones in RIF would definitely eagerly object having >>> them as a >>> RIF Dialect. On the other hand even neutral people would prefer to see a >>> dialect covering their favourite or some popular system rather than >>> uncertainty if it gets to choosing among "n" for standardization. >>> Moreover, >>> as far as I know, the issue of uncertainty LP is not such mature in the >>> sense that there are not so many uncertainty rule bases and systems out >>> there that one would like to interchange between them. So our case is >>> generally weak. >>> >>> Currently, it is not decided how many and which dialects would the group >>> create as well as the requirements for Phase 2 >>> http://www.w3.org/2005/rules/wg/wiki/Design_Constraints, where >>> uncertainty >>> is included, have not been discussed yet. >>> >>> Hope I was concise enough. I also welcome any related questions. >>> >>> Greetings, >>> -gstoil >>> >> >> > > ----------------------------------------------------------------------------- > Ken Laskey > MITRE Corporation, M/S H305 phone: 703-983-7934 > 7151 Colshire Drive fax: 703-983-1379 > McLean VA 22102-7508 > > > >
Received on Monday, 10 September 2007 10:44:07 UTC