Visualizing Information Science Knowledge by Modelling Domain Ontology (OIS)

Abstract

Information Science (IS) is one of the areas that need a unified ontology model to facilitate information in order to access the heterogeneous data resources, and share a common understanding of the domain knowledge. The aim of the study is to develop a generic model of ontology that serves as a foundation of knowledge modelling for applications and aggregation with other ontologies. This study adopts the Methontology methodology to develop an Ontology of Information Science (OIS). To support ontology development, the virtual community of practice of Information science (Ontocop) was employed. The Ontology was coded using Protégé and the OWL web ontology language. The main achievement of the study is that a new model of Information Science Ontology (OIS) has been constructed, which is a generic model that contains only the key objects and associated attributes with their relationships. The model defines the 706 concept, which will be widely used in Information Science applications. The research reveals that OIS ontology is a model that meets the ontology quality criteria for the subject area. It is concluded that OIS ontology unifies information science knowledge, which is composed of Library, Computer, and Archival science, by creating a theoretical base that is useful for further practical systems. The OIS ontology can be reused as the basis for any domain development.