Versioning Element Set Ontology 0.3.6 TeamXML@drc.com DRC Dan King 2005-10-17 deprecated This ontology provides features for versioning of ontologies and instances (artifacts). It includes the following: indications for title, version, status, release level, release date, depreciation and obsolescence. And by referencing the Version Lineage System (VLS) Ontology, enables relations for previous and next versions, and explicit statements for backward compatibility. Some of the elements in the DRCVES, were defined by Dublin Core(DC). Thus, they are defined here with samePropertyAs. The common elements are: title, creator, contributor, and source. Important! -- In practice however, only the DC elements should be used, rather than their VES equivalents. Although the equivalencies have been defined, the DAML Validator does not recognized them as such. For example, a cardinality restriction was placed on the DC title property, but the Validator doesn't allow a VES title to be used in place of the DC title. The opposite is true as well. To facilitate visibility of multiple ontology usage, the restrictions were placed on the DC elements rather than the VES elements. Hence, using the VES elements title, creator, contributor, and source is unrestricted and will result in cardinality violations of their DC equivalents. Versioning This property should be used to associate the version data to a class. Artifact A DAML artifact (DAML-A) is a document that uses the vocabulary defined by one or more DAML ontologies (DAML-O). DAML-A is also referred to as "instance data" and "content." Version Data This class is used to describe the Version Information of a document. Title A title given to the ontology. Important! -- In practice, only the DC elements should be used, rather than their VES equivalents. Although the equivalencies have been defined, the DAML Validator does not recognized them as such. For example, a cardinality restriction was placed on the DC title property, but the Validator doesn't allow a VES title to be used in place of the DC title. The opposite is true as well. To facilitate visibility of multiple ontology usage, the restrictions were placed on the DC elements rather than the VES elements. Hence, using the VES elements title, creator, contributor, and source is unrestricted and will result in cardinality violations of their DC equivalents. Lineage References a particular version lineage. Important! -- In practice, only the VLS lineage should be used, rather than its VES equivalent. Although the equivalency has been defined, the DAML Validator does not recognized it as such. For example, a cardinality restriction was placed on the VLS lineage property, but the Validator doesn't allow a VES lineage to be used in place of the VLS lineage. The opposite is true as well. To facilitate visibility of multiple ontology usage, the restrictions were placed on the VLS property rather than the VES property. Hence, using the VES lineage property is unrestricted. Version The version indication. A version indication is either the term "volatile" or a version number. The term "volatile" indicates that historical versions have no value, thus tracking versions is not meaningful. Accordingly, maintaining a version lineage would also be fruitless. Version numbers must begin with a number and can contain letters, numbers, dashes ("-"), underscores ("_"), and periods ("."). The version number may be used as a directory name and therefore should not contain any characters that would be illegal for that purpose. Email Address The point of contact email addres for the document. Creator An entity primarily responsible for making the content of the ontology. Important! -- In practice, only the DC elements should be used, rather than their VES equivalents. Although the equivalencies have been defined, the DAML Validator does not recognized them as such. For example, a cardinality restriction was placed on the DC title property, but the Validator doesn't allow a VES title to be used in place of the DC title. The opposite is true as well. To facilitate visibility of multiple ontology usage, the restrictions were placed on the DC elements rather than the VES elements. Hence, using the VES elements title, creator, contributor, and source is unrestricted and will result in cardinality violations of their DC equivalents. Contributor An entity responsible for making contributions to the content of the ontology. Important! -- In practice, only the DC elements should be used, rather than their VES equivalents. Although the equivalencies have been defined, the DAML Validator does not recognized them as such. For example, a cardinality restriction was placed on the DC title property, but the Validator doesn't allow a VES title to be used in place of the DC title. The opposite is true as well. To facilitate visibility of multiple ontology usage, the restrictions were placed on the DC elements rather than the VES elements. Hence, using the VES elements title, creator, contributor, and source is unrestricted and will result in cardinality violations of their DC equivalents. Source A Reference to a resource from which the present ontology is partially or fully derived. Important! -- In practice, only the DC elements should be used, rather than their VES equivalents. Although the equivalencies have been defined, the DAML Validator does not recognized them as such. For example, a cardinality restriction was placed on the DC title property, but the Validator doesn't allow a VES title to be used in place of the DC title. The opposite is true as well. To facilitate visibility of multiple ontology usage, the restrictions were placed on the DC elements rather than the VES elements. Hence, using the VES elements title, creator, contributor, and source is unrestricted and will result in cardinality violations of their DC equivalents. Release Date The date the ontology was released/published. Release Level The release level of the document: Development, Alpha, Beta, Stable. The Development level is the beginning of a new release, as such, no guarentees can be made. The product is not available for external/public review. Alpha is the second level of the development cycle in which all critical issues have been resolved. The product is typically not available for external/public review. Beta is the third level of the development cycle in which all serious or greater issues have been resolved, and all documentation is up to date. The product is released specifically for external/public review and testing prior to graduation to the final level. Although external/public review is not required, it is strongly recommended. Stable is the forth and final level of the development cycle in which all medium level or greater issues have been resolved, including issue submitted by outside sources. The product is officially released (published). Modifications to Stable releases is limited to bug fixes and minor/superficial updates. Stable releases are required to remain available externally and/or to the public until it becomes obsolete. Lower level releases have no such requirement. Status The status of the document: Current, Depreciated, Obsolete. The Current status indicates the product is the most recent version in the release history. Applies to all four levels of the development cycle. There can be only one Current-Stable release, and only one Current-(Development, Alpha, or Beta) release. All Current releases can be modified, the extent of which is dependant on its level. The Depreciated status indicates a product has been replaced by a newer version. The Depreciation chain occurs as follows: A Current-Development release begins a new-version branch, it depreciates nothing. A Current-Alpha release depreciates its parent, Development. A Current-Beta release depreciates its parent, Alpha. Finally, a Current-Stable release depreciates two releases: its parent, Beta, and its great-great grandparent, the previous Stable release. Depreciated-(Development, Alpha, and Beta) releases cannot be modified. In rare cases, Depreciated-Stable releases may be updated (bug fixes). However, such updates may never propogate to the depreciated release's Current-Stable descendant. Depreciated releases should store a depreciation date from which obsolesence can be derived implicitly or explicitly. The Obsolete status indicates that a release has reached the end of its lifecycle. Releases in this status are no longer available. Automated systems (agents), and administrators are authorized to free all resources utilized by an Obsolete release. The Obsolete status is likely to be implied (by years of depreciation) more often than explicitly defined. However, explicit definition coud signal an Agent to free resources, rather than doing so manually. Depreciation Date The date the document was replaced by a newer version. Depreciation Years to Obsolescence The number of years a document remains depreciated beore it will become obsolete. A time-to-live period, after which the document should be considered unavailable.