Semantic Enhancement of Virtual Engineering Applications
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Semantic Enhancement of Virtual Engineering Applications By Carlos A. Toro Submitted to the department of Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy At The University of the Basque Country Donostia - San Sebastian 2009 Signature of author Carlos A. Toro Certified by : Prof.Dr Manuel Graña Romay (Thesis Advisor) Certified by : Dr. Jorge Posada (Thesis Advisor) Semantic Enhancement of Virtual Engineering Applications by Carlos A. Toro Submitted to the Department of Computer Science and Artificial Intelligence on March 10, 2009, in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy abstract The scope of this research is the definition of new methodologies and the creation of new tools that allow the Semantic enhancement of Virtual Engineering Applications (VEA) through the Semantic enhancement of their contained Virtual Engineering Tools (VET). This work combines Virtual Engineering Applications (e.g. Computer Aided Design, Steel Detailing, etc.), and state of the art technologies (e.g. Virtual Reality, Augmented Reality, etc) with Semantic techniques in a Product Life Cycle context. vii To my family because they taught me what love really is. Their support for the always absent son gave me the strength to carry on my path. To my friends through all these years, you are the force behind this effort. To music, the most important fuel of my thoughts. Grams, the imprint of you is left on my soul. I miss you. Originality Statement I hereby declare that this submission is my own work and to the best of my knowledge it contains no materials previously published or written by another person, or substantial proportions of material which have been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma at The University of the Basque Country or any other educational institution, except where due acknowledgement is made in the thesis. Any contribution made to the research by others, with whom I have worked at The University of the Basque Country or elsewhere, is explicitly acknowledged in the thesis. I also declare that the intellectual content of this thesis is the product of my own work, except to the extent that assistance from others in the project’s design and conception or in style, presentation and linguistic expression is acknowledged. The author hereby grants to University of the Basque Country permission to reproduce and to distribute copies of this thesis document in whole or in part. Signed: "I was born not knowing and have had only a little time to change that here and there." Richard Feynman, Letter to Armando Garcia J, December 11, 1985 Acknowledgements I truly believe the most surprising discovery I made in the course of this research, are the people that have surrounded me over the years. This thesis exists due in great part to my family, friends and advisors. I would like to take the opportuntity, in the following few paragraphs, to express my sincere gratitude. Firstly to my family, despite the distance they have always managed to make me close and never lacking in my need for their love or comfort. Everyday my unconditional love and respect for them grows. From my professors as an undergraduate in Colombia, I learnt the beauty of science. I would like to thank Prof. Oscar Ruiz, my first advisor and friend who gave me the opportunities to follow the path of research. His advice, counsel and particular way in getting things done has helped me to understand the difference in doing things and felling them. Prof. Alberto Rodriguez, Dean of the School of Engineering, EAFIT University has been a role model to me, without his encouragement and support I wouldn’t be here. His brilliance in teaching has made me understand that something that cannot be taught easily is not worth teaching at all. I would like to thank my advisors Prof. Manuel Graña and Dr. Jorge Posada, their constant support and guidance shone the light when it was needed most. Jorge for me demonstrates the attitude and character of an outstanding researcher. His personal support and his incisive suggestions, have been decisive at many stages of my research. Thank you. Prof. Manuel Graña’s capacity to quickly see my point of view and offer his contributions during my research have had incalculable effect. Prof. Graña’s belief my work, his preparedness to fight for it just as have I, has undoubtedly contributed to the completion of this thesis. I must of course also thank Prof. Edward Szcerbicki for his unwavering support and counsel, not only while I had the privilege to visit his group at the University of Newcastle, Australia, but till this day. It has been an honor to be advised by him and a pleasure to have him on my evaluation board. I want to thank Jon Goya and Fairlight, for the music. I’m certain that without that release I wouldn’t have been able to reach this point. Our music, in the most difficult of days, gave me a way to create new places that eased my mind. I must also express my gratitude to my good friends: Isak Bello, Luis Kabongo, John Congote, Carlos Ocampo-Martinez, Carlos Lamsfus, Giuliano Giacovazzi, Will MaCabe, Nacho muñoz and Josune Ramiro for the many hours of their spare time, support and the moments we have shared, they are not only are the my best of buddies but those who gave me the support I need day in and day out. I would like to thank Olatz Irigaray, teaching me that happiness is found in the smallest, slightest of actions. I would like to say thanks to my dear friend Cesar Maldonado-Sanin who opened his house to me while I was in Australia and still works me from a great distance. Without his help many of the core ideas of this thesis would not exist. Cesar made the impossible possible. He thought me that with enough determination nothing is unreachable. My fellow researchers, colleagues, students at VICOMTech, led by Dr. Julian Florez, all of them deserve a special mention. I want to express my gratitude for the myriad of stimulating conversations that take place every day. I would like to thank Iñigo Barandiaran, Yoli Cobos and Cristina Sarasua for their collaboration and inspiration. xiii Last but not least, I would like to thank the people from the Industrial Applications Department, Sean Gaines, Javi Vaquero, Aitor Moreno and all of the rest of the gang that have since moved on: Maite Termenon, Diana Wald, Verena Wuerbel, Tobias Kammann and Dr. Michael Obach all, you are never far from my thoughts. Carlos Toro March - 2009 Contents 1 Introduction and Overview: Technical Context 1 1.1 A brief word on Semantics . 3 1.2 A short introduction to Virtual Engineering Applications . 3 1.2.1 User-centric Virtual Reality visualization techniques . 4 1.3 Thesis motivation . 5 1.3.1 Problem Statement - Research question . 6 1.3.2 Summary of the main contributions . 6 1.4 Thesis objectives . 7 1.4.1 Research environment and context where this Thesis was de- veloped . 8 1.5 Structure of this Thesis . 9 2 Semantic Modeling 15 2.1 Knowledge Engineering . 15 2.2 The Semantic Web . 16 2.2.1 Ontologies and their use in the context of this document . 17 2.2.2 Ontologies in Computer Science: . 18 2.2.3 Reasons for modeling ontologies . 19 2.2.4 Common components of ontology modeling . 21 2.2.5 Flavors and languages of ontology representation . 25 2.2.6 Ontology development methodologies. 29 2.2.7 Handling Ontologies . 33 2.3 Information and Knowledge extraction from ontologies. 34 2.3.1 A brief word on the Protégé OWL API. 35 xv Contents xvi 2.3.2 Ontology query using query languages . 35 2.3.3 Ontology alignment . 37 2.4 Semantic reasoning . 37 2.4.1 Description Logics (DL) . 39 2.4.2 Reasoner tools: . 40 2.5 Discussion - Other points of view on Semantic Technologies . 44 2.5.1 Skeptical reactions to the Semantic Web concept . 45 2.6 Summary . 48 3 Virtual Engineering and Product Design 49 3.1 Product Life Cycle Management (PLM) . 49 3.1.1 History of the PLM concept . 50 3.1.2 Stages of the PLM . 51 3.2 Relation of PLM and Modern Visualization Techniques . 54 3.3 PLM 2.0 . 55 3.4 Engineering decision support tools (Knowledge engineering in PLM) . 56 3.5 Discussion - Toward Semantically enabled VEA. 57 3.6 Summary . 58 4 Recommendations on User Modeling 61 4.1 User Modeling definition . 61 4.2 User Modeling Recommendations for VEA . 65 4.2.1 Consider User Roles in your User types . 65 4.2.2 Consider implicit Semantics and explicit Semantics in the UM 68 4.2.3 Consider the User Experience in the UM . 70 4.2.4 Distinguish between high and low level Goals when modeling the User . 73 4.3 Discussion - UM recommendations and their relation with the GOMS model . 74 4.3.1 UM recommendations translated to the real world . 75 Contents xvii 5 Recommendations on Domain Modeling based on Engineering Stan- dards 79 5.1 Engineering Standards definition . 81 5.1.1 Standards development process . 81 5.1.2 Benefits of using Standards . 82 5.2 A methodology for using Engineering Standards as models for Knowl- edge Bases . 82 5.3 Discussion - Challenges in using Standards as models for Domain Knowledge Bases . 86 6 The Reflexive Ontologies: A computational methodology for the enhancement of the ontology query process 89 6.1 Background Concepts . 90 6.1.1 Reflexive ontologies, Formal Definition: .