An Ontological Approach to Representing Complex Temporal Expressions in OWL-Time

Abstract

Temporal information encompasses both simple and complex time. Foundational dynamic ontologies typically prioritize the representation of simple time, often neglecting the intricacies associated with complex time. In this context, complex time involves recurring time, imprecise time, and multi-granularity time. Existing foundational dynamic ontologies, such as OWL-Time, are proficient in capturing qualitative information, precise dates, times, and durations. However, they face challenges in encapsulating the nuanced attributes inherent in complex time. Current ontology efforts, particularly within the OWL framework, address complex recurring time through individual extensions rather than by enriching foundational dynamic ontologies with dedicated concepts and relations. The challenge of recurring time, rooted in non-convex interval time, has been extensively discussed in classical literature. To address this challenge within OWL-Time, our work proposes a novel dynamic ontology using a lightweight approach that decomposes the primitive intervals and properties of OWL-Time. This approach also embeds periodic rules, which are advantageous as they defragment patterns of repetition to specific conceptual levels, moving beyond a narrow snapshot focus to a broader conceptual understanding. Toward validate the effectiveness of our approach, we conducted an empirical study assessing the complexity of the ontology using real-world datasets. The experimental results underscore the extended ontology's capacity to faithfully represent and reason of recurring temporal expressions, demonstrating its efficacy in covering a diverse array of recurring time-related classes across various domains.