JOPA: Efficient ontology-based information system design

Abstract

Creating applications on top of linked data and ontologies brings many difficulties. The applications are either generic (and thus not appealing to end-users), or bound to ontology structure, change of which breaks the application. We present JOPA, a tool that formalizes the contract between the application and the ontology, combining advantages of both worlds. JOPA is a persistence framework for Java applications, providing formalized object-ontological mapping, transactions, access to multiple repository contexts, and producing linked data. The system is demonstrated on a real use-case of a reporting tool that we develop for the aviation industry.