From: Sandro Hawke (sandro@w3.org)
Date: 02/15/05
- Call For Participation - W3C Workshop on RULE LANGUAGES FOR INTEROPERABILITY 27-28 April 2005 Washington, D.C. Position Papers Due: 18 March 2005 http://www.w3.org/2004/12/rules-ws/cfp Rule languages and rule systems are widely used in applications ranging from database integration, service provisioning, and business process management to loan underwriting, privacy policies and Web services composition. General purpose rule languages remain relatively unstandardized, however, and rule systems from different suppliers are rarely interoperable. Meanwhile, the Web has achieved remarkable success in allowing documents to be shared and linked throughout the world. More recently, Semantic Web languages like RDF and OWL are beginning to support data/knowledge sharing on the same scale and with considerable flexibility. Having a language for sharing rules is often seen as the next step in promoting data exchange on the Web. This workshop, held by W3C with support from DARPA and hosted by ILOG, is intended to gather various participants and inputs needed to see how a standard rule framework might be developed, informed by Web Architecture and useful for addressing real user challenges. Purpose ======= Background * Rules everywhere Rules are everywhere. They are found in many domains, disciplines, and industries. Business policies, laws and regulations, guidelines and best practices, definitions and axioms, database schema translations, workflow branching and technical constraints, all require a declarative and modular approach to their implementation. There is a thriving commercial market in several families of rule technologies, including production rules, event-condition-action rules, Prolog, relational database systems, and others. However, practical interoperability between these systems, especially across the different families, is currently quite limited. Rules are a key element of the Semantic Web vision, allowing integration, derivation, and transformation of data from multiple sources in a distributed, transparent, and scalable manner. Rules can themselves be treated as data, published on the web, and when URIs (or QNames) are used as symbol-constants in a rule language, they can form useful links between knowledge bases. In a Web services environment, rules offer the opportunity to enable the automation of the enforcement and composition of policies governing the delivery of information, the access to services, or the execution of processes. Rules have advantages of flexibility and manageability. In addition, the declarative nature of rules gives them a special appeal as a programmatic and knowledge representation device in a distributed and Web-based environment, where they can be owned, specified and managed in one place, and applied in many other places. This requires, however, a standard way to represent rules unambiguously for publication and interchange purposes. * Different rules and a common foundation Rules come in a variety of forms for different uses and applications. Business rules, decision tables, and decision trees are used to automate the enforcement of business policies and regulations. Logical formulas, constraints, ontologies, association and transformation rules are used for inferencing in information retrieval and information integration, including databases, and metadata repositories (e.g. Dublin Core Initiative), or in analytical, forecasting and/or optimization applications. Rules, however, trace their roots back to formal logic. There, semantics can be represented via a logical model theory and inference can be based on logical proof theory. The most important de facto semantic standard is first order predicate calculus, unchanged for nearly a hundred years. In the last three decades, declarative logic programs have emerged as a complement to first order logic, and provided the foundation for the semantics of relational databases and many rule languages. Algorithmic techniques and theory for formal logic have been extended to enable, and semantically treat: procedural attachments for built-ins, tests, and actions; and non-monotonicity for negation-as-failure, defaults, inheritance, prioritization, updating, revision, and conflict handling. * Candidate Languages and related work To be effective, practical, and deployable, a Web standard on rules needs to focus on the requirements of end users and the needs of rule technology providers. The goal of being able to transfer rulebases / knowledge bases, or simply to process them with different software, has helped motivate several important standardization or standards-proposing efforts including RuleML and SWRL, n3, Metalog, KIF and ISO Common Logic, ISO Prolog, and others. Some of those have been aimed at more or less specialized purposes, e.g., in the domains of Web Service policies (WS-Policy, WSPL, Policy RuleML, SWSL, WSML), access control and authorization (XACML, EPAL, P3P/APPEL), Business Rules (BRML, SRML), and other areas as well. Related standardization efforts have also started with respect to rule modeling (OMG's Business Semantics for Business Rules RFP and Production Rules Representation RFP) and rulebase execution (JSR 94 - Java API for Rules Engine). Workshop Goals This workshop is a step along the path to establishing a standard language framework to support rule system interoperation on the Web. It aims at gathering vendors, technologists, application developers and users to discuss and provide recommendations to the W3C regarding what is the best approach to the specification of a standard or family of standards for the public representation and exchange of rules on the Web, in terms of avoiding redundant efforts, of optimizing the potential for wide adoption, and of promoting consistency and interoperability between different applications or layers, while preserving their specific requirements. The specific goals for this workshop are: 1. Gather and refine use cases and requirements for a framework; 2. Gather information about available technologies and relevant areas of practice and research; 3. Help establish a common ground for this work as well as a community of possible participants; 4. Understand priorities and time frames and gather information to establish a strategy and a calendar; 5. Help organizations and individuals learn enough about this work to determine their level of commitment going forward. Deliverables The workshop is expected to result in the following deliverables: * Use Cases (ideally with Test Cases) and Potential Requirements * Candidate Technologies * Workshop position papers * Workshop presentations * Workshop minutes * Recommendations regarding future work These will be published on the workshop home page. Scope of the Workshop The scope of this workshop is restricted in order to make the best use of participants' time. In general, discussion at the workshop and in the position papers should stay focused on the workshop goals and deliverables. In scope: * Collecting use cases and articulating requirements * Analyses of the rules market and user base * Comparisons across languages and systems, including both widely deployed and research systems * Discussing the scope of a W3C Working Group in this area * Test cases which clarify use cases and demonstrate key differences between candidate technologies Out of scope: * Detailed technical discussion or presentation of new results, beyond what is necessary to resolve issues concerning the main group of participants. This is not an academic workshop or conference. * Significantly revisiting existing W3C Recommendations * Making decisions. While people can discuss the desirability or practicality of features and observe "straw poll" consensus, the lack of time or structure for deliberation rules out formal decision making. * To avoid a common time sink, we ask that people avoid trying to define the term "rule". An impulse to label something as "not being about rules" or circumscribe the territory can often be reframed as asking more details about a use case. Participation ============= Expected Audience We expect several communities to contribute to the workshop: * Rule users, especially those with a need for system interoperability * Rule systems providers (commercial or non commercial) * Representatives of and participants in related standards efforts * Technical experts Requirements for Participation * Position papers are required to participate in this workshop. Each organization or individual wishing to participate must submit a position paper no later than 18 March. Participation is pending acceptance of the position paper by the program committee. (Government employees who wish to participate but are unable to submit position papers should contact the workshop chairs.) * To ensure maximum interaction among participants, the number of participants will be limited. To ensure maximum diversity, the number of participants per organization will be limited in the event the overall participation limit is reached * There will be no participation fee. * W3C membership is not required * Workshop sessions and documents will be in English * Instructions for how to register will be sent to submitters of accepted position papers. Position Papers Position papers are the basis for the discussion at the workshop. These papers will also be made available to the public from the workshop site. * Topics Position papers discussing applications are expected to focus on the requirements for the public representation and interchange of rules. Position papers discussing interchange formats are expected to focus on the requirements and types of application covered by the proposal. Position papers discussing specifications including a rule interchange format are expected to focus on that aspect and on how they could link to/import rules represented in other existing or emerging formats (or why they cannot). Position papers discussing general issues regarding rules interchange and rule systems interoperability are expected to focus on how relevant existing standards or proposal or parts of an approach can be reused, evolved, extended; on principles and architecture; on related efforts in other communities (OMG, JCP, ISO, RuleML, SWSI, WSMO, etc). * Format All papers should be 1 to 5 pages, although they may link to longer versions or appendixes. Papers should explain the participant's interest in the workshop, explain their position with respect to a standard for publishing and interchanging rules on the Web and include concrete examples of the kind of rules they are interested in. Accepted position papers will be published on the public Web pages of the workshop. Submitting a position paper comprises a default recognition of these terms for publication. Allowed formats are (valid) HTML/XHTML, PDF, or plain text. Papers in any other formats (including invalid HTML/XHTML) will be returned with a request for correct formatting. Good examples of position papers can be seen in the QL'98 workshop. The Program Committee may ask the authors of particularly salient position papers to explicitly present their position at the workshop to foster discussion. Presenters will be asked to make the slides of the presentation available on the workshop home page in HTML, PDF, or plain text. Position papers must be submitted via email to team-rule-language-workshop-submit@w3.org no later than 18 March 2005. Early submissions are appreciated. Workshop Organization ===================== Workshop Chairs * Sandro Hawke (W3C) * Christian de Sainte Marie (ILOG) * Said Tabet (The RuleML Initiative) Program Committee At this time, the program committee is still being assembled. The list so far: * Harold Boley (NRC Canada, RuleML) * Dan Connolly (W3C) * Mike Dean (BBN, DAML) * Stefan Decker (DERI) * Marc Goodner (SAP) * Benjamin Grosof (MIT Sloan, RuleML) * Pat Hayes (IHMC, Common Logic) * Jim Hendler (University of Maryland) * Ian Horrocks (University of Manchester) * Sridhar Iyengar (IBM) * Massimo Marchiori (University of Venice) * Deborah McGuinness (Stanford KSL) * Bob McWhirter (OpenXource, Drools) * Eric Miller (W3C) * Jon Pellant (Pegasystems) * Jos de Roo (Agfa) * Chris Swan (Credit Suisse First Boston) * Paul Vincent (Fair Isaac) Schedule The workshop program will run from 8:30 am to 6 pm on both days. Sponsors ILOG, S.A. will host the workshop, although not in their own facilities. Significant funding for organizing this workshop was provided by DARPA through the DAML program. Venue The workshop will be held in a conference facility (such as a hotel) to be determined, in the Washington, D.C. area. Details will be included with acceptance notification. Important Dates Date Event 15 February 2005 Call For Participation issued 18 March 2005 Deadline for position papers. 1 April 2005 Acceptance notification sent; Program released 15 April 2005 Deadline for registration 27 April 2005 Workshop Begins (8:30 AM) 28 April 2005 Workshop Ends (6 PM) ---------- Sandro Hawke, Said Tabet, Christian de Sainte Marie, with help from Benjamin Grosof Id: cfp.html,v 1.103 2005/02/14 18:53:31 sandro Exp http://www.w3.org/2004/12/rules-ws/cfp
This archive was generated by hypermail 2.1.4 : 02/15/05 EST