CALL FOR PAPERS
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                      Workshop on Matching and Meaning:
      Automated development, evolution and interpretation of ontologies

                   http://dream.inf.ed.ac.uk/workshops/WMM09/

           9th April 2009, part of AISB'09 Convention, Edinburgh, UK


OVERVIEW

The problem of semantic misalignment - of two systems failing to understand one another when their semantic representation is not identical - occurs in a huge variety of areas: the Semantic Web, databases, natural language processing; anywhere, indeed, where semantics are necessary but centralised control is undesirable or impractical.  In highly dynamic domains, where interactions are between a large, diverse and evolving community, there is a need for the resolving of these misalignments - through developing and evolving existing ontologies or interpreting unknown ontologies in terms of known ones - to be done automatically and on-the-fly.

The aim of this workshop is to bring together researchers interested in the problems of automated development, evolution and interpretation of ontologies in the many different domains in which it occurs. We are primarily interested in the exchange of ideas and the stimulation of debate, and the workshop is intended to be a forum for researchers to present ongoing work and ideas and to engage in discussion with other researchers from the field. We are particularly interested in novel ideas and innovative research, which may be in its early stages, and encourage reports on work in progress.

Topics of interest include:

   * Ontology evolution
   * Ontology matching and alignment
   * Ontology versioning
   * Representational or structural change
   * Formal aspects of ontology dynamics
   * Foundational issues
   * Social and collaborative matching
   * Background knowledge in matching
   * Extensions to ontology languages to better support change
   * Belief revision for ontologies and the Semantic Web
   * Inconsistency handling in evolving ontologies
   * Uncertainty in matching
   * Change propagation in ontologies and metadata
   * Ontologies for dynamic environments
   * Dynamic knowledge construction and exploitation
   * Case studies, software tools, use cases, applications
   * Open problems


SUBMISSION GUIDELINES

We encourage the submission of extended abstracts that discuss ongoing research, problem descriptions and overviews of the domain. These may be of any length; we expect two or three pages will be appropriate in most cases. This workshop will be non-archival so it is not necessary that abstracts should meet fixed standards; they are primarily intended to highlight ideas.

Submissions will be subject to light reviewing, mainly intended to check fit to workshop.

Abstracts should be submitted electronically in pdf format to f.j.mcneill-at-ed.ac.uk by 19th December 2008. Notification of acceptance will be sent to the submitting author on 13th February 2009.


VENUE

The workshop will take place at the Edinburgh Convention Centre at Heriot Watt University in Edinburgh, as part of the AISB 2009 Convention (http://www.aisb.org.uk/convention/aisb09/), on April 9th 2009. All workshop participants must be registered for the AISB 2009 Convention. Registration for this workshop is included in the convention registration fee.


IMPORTANT DATES

Submission: Friday, 19th December 2008
Notification: Friday, 13th February 2009
Workshop: 9th April 2009
AISB09 Convention: 6th - 9th April 2009


PROGRAMME

Presentations: Authors of accepted abstracts will give presentations of their work; exact times to be decided.

Posters: If it is not possible to fit in presentations for all accepted authors, some may be asked to present posters instead. There will be a session of 5 minute poster talks.

Panel: The technical programme will end with a 90 minute panel discussion on a topic of mutual interest to be decided. Three speakers will speak for 10 minutes each with a brief to stimulate debate during the remaining 60 minutes. Discussion amongst all participants, rather than question-and-answering for the panel, will be strongly encouraged.


ORGANISERS

Fiona McNeill, University of Edinburgh, UK
Michael Chan, University of Edinburgh, UK


PROGRAMMING COMMITTEE

Manuel Atencia Arcas, IIIA-CSIC, Spain
Paolo Besana, University of Edinburgh, UK
Alan Bundy, University of Edinburgh, UK
Jerome Euzenat, INRIA Grenoble Rhone-Alpes, France
Fausto Giunchiglia, University of Trento, Italy
Adam Pease, Articulate Software, USA
Pavel Shvaiko, TasLab, Informatica Trentina, Italy