Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
UNGEGN World geographic names system did not introduced ontological
approach. Here is made reconstruction of hierarchy relations of conceptual
Figure 9:
Hierarchy of the ontology concepts of the UNGEGN World Geographical Names
database features.
Hierarchical relationship in ontology is only one of many relationships that
can be included in ontology. Basically, it is giving answer on the question
“Is subclass a kind of class?” or subclass relationships.
Hierarchical relations are important in conceptual model, but they are not
the only one. Because of that ontology can become unmanageable
considering size and complexity. Relationships have influence on
simplicity of queries. Simple relationships are requesting simpler queries,
and that is one more argument to make relationships as simple as possible.
To avoid these ontologies could be spitted into modules. Each module of
ontology is describing part of the total domain.
