Polymorphic Knowledge in OWL for Conceptual Design Reuse

Conceptual design mainly relies on designer’s expertise and creativity. The scope of knowledge required to accomplish this task varies in type and complexity. We aim, in this paper, at representing the knowledge in conceptual design through an efficient model that enables its efficient reuse. Ontology, underpinned by its well-known description language OWL, is used. Reuse is conceptualized by case-based reasoning (CBR). The CBR system has been improved for optimally indexing and retrieving previous design experiences. This is achieved by the use of supplementary-information for cases indexing along with the problem description usually used in the CBR system. Some of the supplementary-information is in the form of polymorphic knowledge –context and aggregation. AssemblyRange construct, introduced in a previous work in OWL, enables the representation of polymorphic knowledge in the form of grouped concepts. We revise herein the syntax and semantics of this construct and introduce its reasoning aspect in order to preserve the semantics and consistency of OWL.