Handling Uncertain Time Intervals in OWL 2: Possibility Vs Probability Theories-based Approaches

Abstract

In this paper, we propose an approach to handling uncertain time intervals and related qualitative relations, based on possibility theory. Four contributions are included in this approach. (1) Representing uncertain time intervals and related qualitative relations by extending the 4D-fluents approach with new ontological components. (2) Reasoning about uncertain time intervals by extending the Allen's interval algebra. The resulting interval relations preserve the good properties of the original algebra. (3) Proposing an OWL 2 possibilistic temporal ontology based on 4D-fluents approach extension and Allen's interval algebra extension. The proposed qualitative temporal relations are inferred via a set of SWRL rules. We validate our work by implementing a prototype based on this ontology. (4) Applying our work to PersonLink ontology and comparing the obtained results with our previous works.