Semantic Annotation for Process Models: - Department of Computer ...

5.3. RELATIONS BETWEEN PROCESS MODELS AND A GOAL ONTOLOGY87
Figure 5.1: Meta-model of the proposed goal ontology
process model depicts a process, and a process consists of numbers of activities. As we
have defined in GPO, an activity may be an atomic activity or a composite activity.
In our semantic annotation framework, we define that a process model comprises a
set of activities (AV) and an activity can be decomposed into sub-activities. If an
activity in a process model is not an atomic activity 1 which is composed of a set of
related activities, it is regarded as a process model fragment in this context. A goal
(g) can be linked to a whole process model or to a process model fragment. We assume
that process models are already organized into a decomposable hierarchy of activities
referencing a domain ontology in the model annotation phase. Each level of activities
in the hierarchy can be considered as goal annotation targets.
Definition 9. In the semantic annotation framework, a process model (PM) can be
partitioned into several process model fragments (PMF). Each PMF comprises a set of
hierarchically organized and decomposable AV.
PM = PMF ⊗ PMF and PMF = AV ⊗ AV
Definition 10. Any goal concept (g) in a goal ontology (G) is possibly related to an
activity (av) in a PM/PMF:
∀(g, av)goalRelated(g, av)
• if the property targetActivity (av ′ ) of a g is same or synonymous with av:
(a)
∃(av ′ )targetActivity(g, av ′ ) ∧ av ′ = av
(b)
• if the property targetArtifact (a f ′ ) of a g is related to the output of av and the
State (s’) of a f ′ is the value of the Output (o) of the Artifact (a f ):
∃(a f ′ , a f , s ′ , o)targetArti f act(g, a f ′ ) ∧ hasState(a f ′ , s ′ ) ∧
s ′ = o ⊃ hasOutput(av, o) ∧ a f ′ = a f ⊃ relatedTo(o, a f)
1 Note: An atomic activity can not be decomposed, but it is not an event either.
(c)