CFP: W3C Workshop on Rule Languages for Interoperability

		      - Call For Participation -


			   W3C Workshop on
		 RULE LANGUAGES FOR INTEROPERABILITY

			   27-28 April 2005
			   Washington, D.C.

		  Position Papers Due: 18 March 2005

		http://www.w3.org/2004/12/rules-ws/cfp

   Rule languages and rule systems are widely used in applications
   ranging from database integration, service provisioning, and
   business process management to loan underwriting, privacy policies
   and Web services composition. General purpose rule languages remain
   relatively unstandardized, however, and rule systems from different
   suppliers are rarely interoperable.

   Meanwhile, the Web has achieved remarkable success in allowing
   documents to be shared and linked throughout the world. More
   recently, Semantic Web languages like RDF and OWL are beginning to
   support data/knowledge sharing on the same scale and with
   considerable flexibility. Having a language for sharing rules is
   often seen as the next step in promoting data exchange on the Web.

   This workshop, held by W3C with support from DARPA and hosted by
   ILOG, is intended to gather various participants and inputs needed
   to see how a standard rule framework might be developed, informed
   by Web Architecture and useful for addressing real user challenges.

Purpose
=======

  Background

   * Rules everywhere

   Rules are everywhere. They are found in many domains, disciplines, and
   industries. Business policies, laws and regulations, guidelines and
   best practices, definitions and axioms, database schema translations,
   workflow branching and technical constraints, all require a
   declarative and modular approach to their implementation. There is a
   thriving commercial market in several families of rule technologies,
   including production rules, event-condition-action rules, Prolog,
   relational database systems, and others. However, practical
   interoperability between these systems, especially across the
   different families, is currently quite limited.

   Rules are a key element of the Semantic Web vision, allowing
   integration, derivation, and transformation of data from multiple
   sources in a distributed, transparent, and scalable manner. Rules can
   themselves be treated as data, published on the web, and when URIs (or
   QNames) are used as symbol-constants in a rule language, they can form
   useful links between knowledge bases. In a Web services environment,
   rules offer the opportunity to enable the automation of the
   enforcement and composition of policies governing the delivery of
   information, the access to services, or the execution of processes.

   Rules have advantages of flexibility and manageability. In addition,
   the declarative nature of rules gives them a special appeal as a
   programmatic and knowledge representation device in a distributed and
   Web-based environment, where they can be owned, specified and managed
   in one place, and applied in many other places. This requires,
   however, a standard way to represent rules unambiguously for
   publication and interchange purposes.

   * Different rules and a common foundation

   Rules come in a variety of forms for different uses and applications.
   Business rules, decision tables, and decision trees are used to
   automate the enforcement of business policies and regulations. Logical
   formulas, constraints, ontologies, association and transformation
   rules are used for inferencing in information retrieval and
   information integration, including databases, and metadata
   repositories (e.g. Dublin Core Initiative), or in analytical,
   forecasting and/or optimization applications.

   Rules, however, trace their roots back to formal logic. There,
   semantics can be represented via a logical model theory and inference
   can be based on logical proof theory. The most important de facto
   semantic standard is first order predicate calculus, unchanged for
   nearly a hundred years. In the last three decades, declarative logic
   programs have emerged as a complement to first order logic, and
   provided the foundation for the semantics of relational databases and
   many rule languages. Algorithmic techniques and theory for formal
   logic have been extended to enable, and semantically treat: procedural
   attachments for built-ins, tests, and actions; and non-monotonicity
   for negation-as-failure, defaults, inheritance, prioritization,
   updating, revision, and conflict handling.

   * Candidate Languages and related work

   To be effective, practical, and deployable, a Web standard on rules
   needs to focus on the requirements of end users and the needs of rule
   technology providers. The goal of being able to transfer rulebases /
   knowledge bases, or simply to process them with different software,
   has helped motivate several important standardization or
   standards-proposing efforts including RuleML and SWRL, n3, Metalog,
   KIF and ISO Common Logic, ISO Prolog, and others. Some of those have
   been aimed at more or less specialized purposes, e.g., in the domains
   of Web Service policies (WS-Policy, WSPL, Policy RuleML, SWSL, WSML),
   access control and authorization (XACML, EPAL, P3P/APPEL), Business
   Rules (BRML, SRML), and other areas as well. Related standardization
   efforts have also started with respect to rule modeling (OMG's
   Business Semantics for Business Rules RFP and Production Rules
   Representation RFP) and rulebase execution (JSR 94 - Java API for
   Rules Engine).

  Workshop Goals

   This workshop is a step along the path to establishing a standard
   language framework to support rule system interoperation on the Web.
   It aims at gathering vendors, technologists, application developers
   and users to discuss and provide recommendations to the W3C regarding
   what is the best approach to the specification of a standard or family
   of standards for the public representation and exchange of rules on
   the Web, in terms of avoiding redundant efforts, of optimizing the
   potential for wide adoption, and of promoting consistency and
   interoperability between different applications or layers, while
   preserving their specific requirements.

   The specific goals for this workshop are:
    1. Gather and refine use cases and requirements for a framework;
    2. Gather information about available technologies and relevant areas
       of practice and research;
    3. Help establish a common ground for this work as well as a
       community of possible participants;
    4. Understand priorities and time frames and gather information to
       establish a strategy and a calendar;
    5. Help organizations and individuals learn enough about this work to
       determine their level of commitment going forward.

  Deliverables

   The workshop is expected to result in the following deliverables:
     * Use Cases (ideally with Test Cases) and Potential Requirements
     * Candidate Technologies
     * Workshop position papers
     * Workshop presentations
     * Workshop minutes
     * Recommendations regarding future work

   These will be published on the workshop home page.

  Scope of the Workshop

   The scope of this workshop is restricted in order to make the best use
   of participants' time. In general, discussion at the workshop and in
   the position papers should stay focused on the workshop goals and
   deliverables.

   In scope:
     * Collecting use cases and articulating requirements
     * Analyses of the rules market and user base
     * Comparisons across languages and systems, including both widely
       deployed and research systems
     * Discussing the scope of a W3C Working Group in this area
     * Test cases which clarify use cases and demonstrate key differences
       between candidate technologies

   Out of scope:
     * Detailed technical discussion or presentation of new results,
       beyond what is necessary to resolve issues concerning the main
       group of participants. This is not an academic workshop or
       conference.
     * Significantly revisiting existing W3C Recommendations
     * Making decisions. While people can discuss the desirability or
       practicality of features and observe "straw poll" consensus, the
       lack of time or structure for deliberation rules out formal
       decision making.
     * To avoid a common time sink, we ask that people avoid trying to
       define the term "rule". An impulse to label something as "not
       being about rules" or circumscribe the territory can often be
       reframed as asking more details about a use case.

Participation
=============

  Expected Audience

   We expect several communities to contribute to the workshop:
     * Rule users, especially those with a need for system
       interoperability
     * Rule systems providers (commercial or non commercial)
     * Representatives of and participants in related standards efforts
     * Technical experts

  Requirements for Participation

     * Position papers are required to participate in this workshop. Each
       organization or individual wishing to participate must submit a
       position paper no later than 18 March. Participation is pending
       acceptance of the position paper by the program committee.
       (Government employees who wish to participate but are unable to
       submit position papers should contact the workshop chairs.)
     * To ensure maximum interaction among participants, the number of
       participants will be limited. To ensure maximum diversity, the
       number of participants per organization will be limited in the
       event the overall participation limit is reached
     * There will be no participation fee.
     * W3C membership is not required
     * Workshop sessions and documents will be in English
     * Instructions for how to register will be sent to submitters of
       accepted position papers.

  Position Papers

   Position papers are the basis for the discussion at the workshop.
   These papers will also be made available to the public from the
   workshop site.

   * Topics

   Position papers discussing applications are expected to focus on the
   requirements for the public representation and interchange of rules.
   Position papers discussing interchange formats are expected to focus
   on the requirements and types of application covered by the proposal.
   Position papers discussing specifications including a rule interchange
   format are expected to focus on that aspect and on how they could link
   to/import rules represented in other existing or emerging formats (or
   why they cannot). Position papers discussing general issues regarding
   rules interchange and rule systems interoperability are expected to
   focus on how relevant existing standards or proposal or parts of an
   approach can be reused, evolved, extended; on principles and
   architecture; on related efforts in other communities (OMG, JCP, ISO,
   RuleML, SWSI, WSMO, etc).

   * Format

   All papers should be 1 to 5 pages, although they may link to longer
   versions or appendixes. Papers should explain the participant's
   interest in the workshop, explain their position with respect to a
   standard for publishing and interchanging rules on the Web and include
   concrete examples of the kind of rules they are interested in.

   Accepted position papers will be published on the public Web pages of
   the workshop. Submitting a position paper comprises a default
   recognition of these terms for publication. Allowed formats are
   (valid) HTML/XHTML, PDF, or plain text. Papers in any other formats
   (including invalid HTML/XHTML) will be returned with a request for
   correct formatting. Good examples of position papers can be seen in
   the QL'98 workshop.

   The Program Committee may ask the authors of particularly salient
   position papers to explicitly present their position at the workshop
   to foster discussion. Presenters will be asked to make the slides of
   the presentation available on the workshop home page in HTML, PDF, or
   plain text.

   Position papers must be submitted via email to
   team-rule-language-workshop-submit@w3.org no later than 18 March 2005.
   Early submissions are appreciated.

Workshop Organization
=====================

  Workshop Chairs

     * Sandro Hawke (W3C)
     * Christian de Sainte Marie (ILOG)
     * Said Tabet (The RuleML Initiative)

  Program Committee

   At this time, the program committee is still being assembled. The list
   so far:
     * Harold Boley (NRC Canada, RuleML)
     * Dan Connolly (W3C)
     * Mike Dean (BBN, DAML)
     * Stefan Decker (DERI)
     * Marc Goodner (SAP)
     * Benjamin Grosof (MIT Sloan, RuleML)
     * Pat Hayes (IHMC, Common Logic)
     * Jim Hendler (University of Maryland)
     * Ian Horrocks (University of Manchester)
     * Sridhar Iyengar (IBM)
     * Massimo Marchiori (University of Venice)
     * Deborah McGuinness (Stanford KSL)
     * Bob McWhirter (OpenXource, Drools)
     * Eric Miller (W3C)
     * Jon Pellant (Pegasystems)
     * Jos de Roo (Agfa)
     * Chris Swan (Credit Suisse First Boston)
     * Paul Vincent (Fair Isaac)

  Schedule

   The workshop program will run from 8:30 am to 6 pm on both days.

  Sponsors

   ILOG, S.A. will host the workshop, although not in their own
   facilities.

   Significant funding for organizing this workshop was provided by DARPA
   through the DAML program.

  Venue

   The workshop will be held in a conference facility (such as a hotel)
   to be determined, in the Washington, D.C. area. Details will be
   included with acceptance notification.

  Important Dates

         Date                           Event
   15 February 2005 Call For Participation issued
   18 March 2005    Deadline for position papers.
   1  April 2005    Acceptance notification sent; Program released
   15 April 2005    Deadline for registration
   27 April 2005    Workshop Begins (8:30 AM)
   28 April 2005    Workshop Ends (6 PM)

----------
Sandro Hawke, Said Tabet, Christian de Sainte Marie, with help from
Benjamin Grosof
Id: cfp.html,v 1.103 2005/02/14 18:53:31 sandro Exp 
http://www.w3.org/2004/12/rules-ws/cfp

Received on Tuesday, 15 February 2005 20:39:46 UTC