Situation Modeling in Decision Support Systems

The paper addresses the problem of situation modeling for decision support purposes. Knowledge-based contexts of two types are used for situation modeling. Abstract context is an ontology-based problem model supplied with links to information sources that provide values for the class attributes included in the abstract context. It integrates knowledge relevant to the current situation from an application ontology (a model of a macro situation). Operational context is the abstract context instantiated with the values taken from information sources. It is a situation model along with changeable data. The proposed ideas are illustrated through a case study of disaster relief and evacuation. The concept of modeling situation as context allows decision support systems to take into account dynamic of information