An Optimization Strategy for Debugging Incoherent Terminologies in Dynamic Environments

Ontologies in real-world applications are typically dynamic entities that are frequently modified when new knowledge needs to be added or when existing knowledge is no longer considered valid. Logical errors inevitably occur when ontologies are modified. To effectively identify the problematic axioms that are responsible for these logical errors, an optimization strategy based on the clash sequence strategy is proposed for debugging the incoherent terminologies in dynamic environments. The clash sequence strategy is used to identify the clash set from an incoherent terminology, and then the debugging work can be performed on the identified clash set than on the entire terminology. A heuristic strategy is also proposed to reuse the results of the previous debugging and to provide information for the next debugging. The experiment results show that the proposed debugging approach based on clash sequences can achieve a significant improvement especially for large-scale ontologies in many cases.