Semantic Service Modeling: Enabling System Interoperability.

Interoperability is the capability of different systems to use each other’s services effectively. It is about sharing functionality and information between systems at different levels, e.g., between physical devices, software applications, business units within one organization, or between different organizations. Interoperability implies that systems are able to interact (i.e., exchange messages), read and understand each other’s messages, and share the same expectations about the effect of the message exchange. In this paper we analyze and define in detail what it means for software systems to be interoperable. We identify three different levels of interoperability – the syntactic, semantic and pragmatic level – and define the requirements for assessing interoperability at each of these levels. We propose a method for formally verifying the semantic and pragmatic interoperability of a number of systems, given a target for integration

Semantic Support for Automated Negotiation with Alliances

Companies can form alliances on the Internet to aggregate buying or selling power and create value. More concretely, together resources are shared or new possibilities are exploited that cannot be exploited individually. Most alliances are formed as a result of a negotiation process between the companies that form an alliance. This paper proposes a software framework that enables automated negotiation between alliances. Our framework allows for the semantic description of negotiation objects and their attributes, and provides a mean for the exchange of negotiation messages unambiguously interpretable by all parties involved. The proposed framework supports ad-hoc alliances by allowing parties with a common interest to negotiate on the proposal they want to make to other market participants first

Extending UDDI with Context-Aware Features Based on Semantic Service Descriptions

The web has evolved from the HTML-based repositories of text and images towards the current web services and semantic web developments. Web services are believed to help the integration of diverse applications while the semantic web promises to increase the "intelligence" of the web, enabling richer discovery, data integration, navigation and automation of tasks. A natural next step would be the combination of these developments, resulting in semantic web services. Another trend we observe is the development of next generation networks, such as GPRS and UMTS, which provide a richer environment as they will have access to information about the user’s, location, preferences and changing environment. With the aid of this information, service providers will be able to develop services that adapt to the user’s context. However, current web services technologies, based on WSDL and UDDI, do not provide a means for context-aware service discovery. In this paper we present the design and implementation of an enhanced UDDI server, capable of storage, matching and retrieval of semantically rich service profiles that contain contextual information. We also present a tool that facilitates the creation, publication and discovery of such service profiles

A Method for Formal Verification of Service Interoperability

Service interoperability is a major obstacle in realizing the SOA vision. Interoperability is the capability of multiple, autonomous and heterogeneous systems to use each other’s services effectively. It is about the meaningful sharing of functionality and information that leads to the achievement of a common goal. In this paper we identify requirements for semantic and pragmatic interoperability. We further propose a method for assessing whether a composite system meets these requirements

Requirements and Method for Assessment of Service Interoperability.

Service interoperability is a major obstacle in realizing the SOA vision. Interoperability is the capability of multiple, autonomous and heterogeneous systems to use each other’s services effectively. It is about the meaningful sharing of functionality and information that leads to the achievement of a common goal. In this paper we systematically explain what interoperability means and analyze possible interoperability problems. Further, we define requirements for service interoperability and present a method to assess whether a composite system meets the identified requirements