A fuzzy-based approach for representing and reasoning on imprecise time intervals in fuzzy-owl 2 ontology

Abstract

Representing and reasoning on imprecise temporal information is a common requirement in the field of Semantic Web. Many works exist to represent and reason on precise temporal information in OWL; however, to the best of our knowledge, none of these works is devoted to represent and reason on imprecise time intervals. To address this problem, we propose a fuzzy-based approach for representing and reasoning on imprecise time intervals in ontology. Our approach is based on fuzzy sets theory and fuzzy tools and is modeled in Fuzzy-OWL 2. The 4D-fluents approach is extended, with new fuzzy components, in order to represent imprecise time intervals and qualitative fuzzy interval relations. The Allen’s interval algebra is extended in order to compare imprecise time intervals in a fuzzy gradual personalized way. Inferences are done via a set of Mamdani IF-THEN rules.