Linking Models, Metamodels, Ontologies and Modelling Languages

Abstract

In his investigation of the correspondences of terminology in the metamodelling and the ontology subdisciplines, Henderson-Sellers (2011b) concludes, as here, that there is a correspondence between a domain-specific ontology and the method domain in Fig.  1.10 (roughly OMG layer M2 in the architecture of Fig.  1.9). This ontology must be represented by a language, where this language may itself be defined by a metamodel (OMG M2 or ISO Metamodel Domain). This is named, variously, meta-ontology, ontology specification language, foundational ontology or higher level ontology (see Fig.  5.7 and previous discussion). Such a language provides reasoning support not possible in software modelling languages such as UML or ER, which many researchers are tempted to use and/or extend for this purpose.