SIST ISO 21127:2017
Information and documentation -- A reference ontology for the interchange of cultural heritage information
Information and documentation -- A reference ontology for the interchange of cultural heritage information
This International Standard establishes guidelines for the exchange of information between cultural
heritage institutions. In simple terms, this can be defined as the information managed by museums,
libraries, and archives.
A more detailed definition can be articulated by defining both the intended scope, a broad and maximally
inclusive definition of general principles, and the practical scope, which is defined by reference to a set
of specific museum documentation standards and practices.
The intended scope of this International Standard is defined as the exchange and integration of
heterogeneous scientific documentation relating to museum collections. This definition requires further
elaboration.
— The term “scientific documentation” is intended to convey the requirement that the depth and quality
of descriptive information that can be handled by this International Standard need to be sufficient
for serious academic research. This does not mean that information intended for presentation to
members of the general public is excluded, but rather that this International Standard is intended
to provide the level of detail and precision expected and required by museum professionals and
researchers in the field.
— The term “museum collections” is intended to cover all types of material collected and displayed
by museums and related institutions, as defined by ICOM3). This includes collections, sites, and
monuments relating to fields such as social history, ethnography, archaeology, fine and applied arts,
natural history, history of sciences and technology.
— The documentation of collections includes the detailed description of individual items within
collections, groups of items, and collections as a whole. This International Standard is specifically
intended to cover contextual information (i.e. the historical, geographical, and theoretical
background that gives museum collections much of their cultural significance and value).
— The exchange of relevant information with libraries and archives, and harmonization with their
models, falls within the intended scope of this International Standard.
— Information required solely for the administration and management of cultural institutions, such as
information relating to personnel, accounting, and visitor statistics, falls outside the intended scope
of this International Standard.
The practical scope4) of this International Standard is the set of reference standards for museum
documentation that have been used to guide and validate its development. This International Standard
covers the same domain of discourse as the union of these reference documents; consequently, for any
data that is correctly encoded in accordance with any of these reference documents, a form of encoding
can be created that is both compatible with the current standard and which entails no semantic loss.
Information et documentation -- Une ontologie de référence pour l'échange d'informations du patrimoine culturel
L'ISO 21127:2014 fixe des lignes directrices pour l'�change d'informations entre institutions patrimoniales. En termes simples, on peut dire qu'il s'agit de l'information g�r�e par les mus�es, les biblioth�ques et les archives.
Le domaine d'application vis� par l'ISO 21127:2014 porte sur l'�change et l'int�gration de la documentation scientifique h�t�rog�ne relative aux collections mus�ales. Cette d�finition appelle un d�veloppement.
Informatika in dokumentacija - Referenčna ontologija za izmenjavo informacij o kulturni dediščini
Ta mednarodni standard podaja smernice za izmenjavo informacij med institucijami za kulturno dediščino. Te so lahko preprosto opredeljene kot informacije, s katerimi upravljajo muzeji, knjižnice in arhivi.
Podrobnejšo opredelitev se lahko oblikuje tako, da se opredeli namenski obseg, tj. široka in kar najbolj vključujoča opredelitev splošnih načel, ter praktični obseg, ki je opredeljen s sklicem na skupino določenih standardov in praks glede muzejske dokumentacije.
Namenski obseg tega mednarodnega standarda je opredeljen kot izmenjava in integracija
heterogene znanstvene dokumentacije, ki je povezana z muzejskimi zbirkami. To opredelitev je treba dodatno izpopolniti.
– Izraz »znanstvena dokumentacija« določa zahtevo, da morata biti globina in kakovost opisnih informacij, ki jih lahko ureja ta mednarodni standard, ustrezni za resno akademsko raziskavo. To ne pomeni, da so informacije, namenjene predstavitvi širši publiki, izključene, ampak da je namen tega mednarodnega standarda zagotavljati raven podrobnosti in natančnosti, ki jo pričakujejo in zahtevajo muzejski strokovnjaki in raziskovalci na tem področju.
– Izraz »muzejske zbirke« zajema vse vrste materialov, ki jih zbirajo in razstavljajo
muzeji in z njimi povezane ustanove, kot določa ICOM). To vključuje zbirke, najdišča in spomenike, ki spadajo na področja, kot so družbena zgodovina, etnografija, arheologija, umetnost in uporabna umetnost, naravoslovje ter zgodovina znanosti in tehnologije.
– Dokumentiranje zbirk vključuje podroben opis posameznih elementov znotraj zbirk, skupin elementov in celotnih zbirk. Ta mednarodni standard zajema
kontekstualne informacije (tj. zgodovinsko, geografsko in teoretsko ozadje, ki muzejskim zbirkam dajejo dobršen del njihove kulturne pomembnosti in vrednosti).
– Izmenjava ustreznih informacij s knjižnicami in arhivi ter uskladitev z njihovimi
modeli spadata na predvideno področje uporabe tega mednarodnega standarda.
– Informacije, ki se zahtevajo samo za administrativne zadeve kulturnih ustanov in njihovo upravljanje, kot so informacije o osebju, računovodski podatki in statistike obiskovalcev, ne spadajo na predvideno področje uporabe tega mednarodnega standarda.
Praktični obseg tega mednarodnega standarda predstavlja skupina referenčnih standardov o muzejski
dokumentaciji, ki se uporabljajo za usmerjanje in ocenjevanje njenega razvoja. Ta mednarodni standard zajema isto domeno diskurza kot skupina teh referenčnih dokumentov; posledično se lahko za vse podatke, ki so pravilno zapisani skladno s katerimkoli od teh referenčnih dokumentov, oblikuje oblika zapisa, ki je združljiva s trenutnim standardom in hkrati ne vodi do pomenske izgube v podatkih.
General Information
Relations
Buy Standard
Standards Content (Sample)
INTERNATIONAL ISO
STANDARD 21127
Second edition
2014-10-15
Information and documentation — A
reference ontology for the interchange
of cultural heritage information
Information et documentation — Une ontologie de référence pour
l’échange d’informations du patrimoine culturel
Reference number
ISO 21127:2014(E)
©
ISO 2014
---------------------- Page: 1 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(E)
COPYRIGHT PROTECTED DOCUMENT
© ISO 2014
All rights reserved. Unless otherwise specified, no part of this publication may be reproduced or utilized otherwise in any form
or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, or posting on the internet or an intranet, without prior
written permission. Permission can be requested from either ISO at the address below or ISO’s member body in the country of
the requester.
ISO copyright office
Case postale 56 • CH-1211 Geneva 20
Tel. + 41 22 749 01 11
Fax + 41 22 749 09 47
E-mail copyright@iso.org
Web www.iso.org
Published in Switzerland
ii © ISO 2014 – All rights reserved
---------------------- Page: 2 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(E)
Contents Page
Foreword .iv
Introduction .v
1 Scope . 1
2 Conformance . 1
3 Terms and definitions . 2
4 Structure and presentation . 6
4.1 Property quantifiers . 6
4.2 Naming conventions . 8
5 Modelling principles . 9
5.1 Monotonicity . 9
5.2 Minimality . 9
5.3 Shortcuts . 9
5.4 Disjointness .10
5.5 Types.10
5.6 Extensions .11
5.7 Coverage of intended scope .11
6 Class declarations .12
7 Property declarations .54
Annex A (informative) Class hierarchy .98
Bibliography .104
© ISO 2014 – All rights reserved iii
---------------------- Page: 3 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(E)
Foreword
ISO (the International Organization for Standardization) is a worldwide federation of national standards
bodies (ISO member bodies). The work of preparing International Standards is normally carried out
through ISO technical committees. Each member body interested in a subject for which a technical
committee has been established has the right to be represented on that committee. International
organizations, governmental and non-governmental, in liaison with ISO, also take part in the work.
ISO collaborates closely with the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) on all matters of
electrotechnical standardization.
The procedures used to develop this document and those intended for its further maintenance are
described in the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 1. In particular the different approval criteria needed for the
different types of ISO documents should be noted. This document was drafted in accordance with the
editorial rules of the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2 (see www.iso.org/directives).
Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this document may be the subject of
patent rights. ISO shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights. Details of
any patent rights identified during the development of the document will be in the Introduction and/or
on the ISO list of patent declarations received (see www.iso.org/patents).
Any trade name used in this document is information given for the convenience of users and does not
constitute an endorsement.
For an explanation on the meaning of ISO specific terms and expressions related to conformity
assessment, as well as information about ISO’s adherence to the WTO principles in the Technical Barriers
to Trade (TBT) see the following URL: Foreword - Supplementary information
The committee responsible for this document is ISO/TC 46, Information and documentation, Subcommittee
SC 4, Technical interoperability, in collaboration with the International Council of Museums Committee
for Documentation (ICOM CIDOC).
This second edition cancels and replaces the first edition (ISO 21127:2006), which has been technically
revised.
iv © ISO 2014 – All rights reserved
---------------------- Page: 4 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(E)
Introduction
This International Standard is the culmination of more than a decade of standards development work
by the International Committee for Documentation (CIDOC) of the International Council of Museums
(ICOM). Work on this International Standard began in 1996 under the auspices of the ICOM-CIDOC
1)
Documentation Standards Working Group. The document provided by CIDOC formed the basis for
ISO 21127 which was first published in 2006. While the initial impetus for the work came from the
museum community, it has since spread to encompass other types of cultural heritage institution. This
International Standard has been appropriated and extended to meet the needs of other institutions
dealing with cultural heritage.
The primary purpose of this International Standard is to offer a conceptual basis for the mediation
of information between cultural heritage organizations such as museums, libraries, and archives.
This International Standard aims to provide a common reference point against which divergent and
incompatible sources of information can be compared and, ultimately, harmonized.
2)
[1]
ISO 21127 is an ontology for cultural heritage information: a formal representation of the conceptual
scheme, or “world view”, underlying the database applications and documentation systems that are used
by cultural heritage institutions. It is important to note that this International Standard aims to clarify
the logic of what cultural heritage institutions do in fact document; it is not intended as a normative
specification of what they should document. The primary role of this International Standard is to enable
information exchange and integration between heterogeneous sources of cultural heritage information.
It aims to provide the semantic definitions and clarifications needed to transform disparate, localized
information sources into a coherent global resource, be it within an institution, an intranet, or on the
Internet.
The specific aims of this International Standard are to
— serve as a common language for domain experts and IT developers when formulating requirements,
— serve as a formal language for the identification of common information contents in different data
formats; in particular to support the implementation of automatic data transformation algorithms
from local to global data structures without loss of meaning. These transformation algorithms are
useful for data exchange, data migration from legacy systems, data information integration, and
mediation of heterogeneous sources,
— support associative queries against integrated resources by providing a global model of the basic
classes and their associations to formulate such queries, and
— provide developers of information systems with a guide to good practice in conceptual modelling.
The ISO 21127 ontology is expressed as a series of interrelated concepts with definitions. This
presentation is similar to that used for a thesaurus. However, the ontology is not intended as a terminology
standard and does not set out to define the terms that are typically used as data in cultural heritage
documentation. Although the presentation provided here is complete, it is an intentionally compact
and concise presentation of the ontology’s 86 classes and 137 unique properties. It does not attempt
to articulate the inheritance of properties by subclasses throughout the class hierarchy (this would
require the declaration of several thousand properties, as opposed to 137). However, this definition
does contain all the information needed to infer and automatically generate a full declaration of all
properties, including inherited properties.
1) The CIDOC CRM Special Interest Group continues to maintain a version of this original document, usually
known as the “CIDOC Conceptual Reference Model” or CIDOC CRM.
2) In the sense used in computer science, i.e. it describes in a formal language the relevant explicit and implicit
concepts and the relationships between them.
© ISO 2014 – All rights reserved v
---------------------- Page: 5 ----------------------
INTERNATIONAL STANDARD ISO 21127:2014(E)
Information and documentation — A reference ontology
for the interchange of cultural heritage information
1 Scope
This International Standard establishes guidelines for the exchange of information between cultural
heritage institutions. In simple terms, this can be defined as the information managed by museums,
libraries, and archives.
A more detailed definition can be articulated by defining both the intended scope, a broad and maximally
inclusive definition of general principles, and the practical scope, which is defined by reference to a set
of specific museum documentation standards and practices.
The intended scope of this International Standard is defined as the exchange and integration of
heterogeneous scientific documentation relating to museum collections. This definition requires further
elaboration.
— The term “scientific documentation” is intended to convey the requirement that the depth and quality
of descriptive information that can be handled by this International Standard need to be sufficient
for serious academic research. This does not mean that information intended for presentation to
members of the general public is excluded, but rather that this International Standard is intended
to provide the level of detail and precision expected and required by museum professionals and
researchers in the field.
— The term “museum collections” is intended to cover all types of material collected and displayed
3)
by museums and related institutions, as defined by ICOM . This includes collections, sites, and
monuments relating to fields such as social history, ethnography, archaeology, fine and applied arts,
natural history, history of sciences and technology.
— The documentation of collections includes the detailed description of individual items within
collections, groups of items, and collections as a whole. This International Standard is specifically
intended to cover contextual information (i.e. the historical, geographical, and theoretical
background that gives museum collections much of their cultural significance and value).
— The exchange of relevant information with libraries and archives, and harmonization with their
models, falls within the intended scope of this International Standard.
— Information required solely for the administration and management of cultural institutions, such as
information relating to personnel, accounting, and visitor statistics, falls outside the intended scope
of this International Standard.
4)
The practical scope of this International Standard is the set of reference standards for museum
documentation that have been used to guide and validate its development. This International Standard
covers the same domain of discourse as the union of these reference documents; consequently, for any
data that is correctly encoded in accordance with any of these reference documents, a form of encoding
can be created that is both compatible with the current standard and which entails no semantic loss.
2 Conformance
Users intending to take advantage of the semantic interoperability offered by this International Standard
should ensure conformance with the relevant data structures. Conformance pertains either to data
3) The ICOM Statutes provide a definition of the term “museum” at .
4) The practical scope of the CIDOC CRM, including a list of the relevant museum documentation standards, is
discussed in more detail on the CIDOC CRM website at < http://cidoc-crm.org/scope.html >.
© ISO 2014 – All rights reserved 1
---------------------- Page: 6 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(E)
to be made accessible in an integrated environment or intended for transport to other environments.
Any encoding of data in a formal language that preserves the relations of the classes, properties, and
inheritance rules defined by this International Standard, is regarded as conformant.
Conformance with this International Standard does not require complete matching of all local
documentation structures, nor that all concepts and structures present in this International Standard
be implemented. This International Standard is intended to allow room both for extensions, needed
to capture the full richness of cultural information, and for simplification, in the interests of economy.
A system will be deemed partially conformant if it supports a subset of subclasses and subproperties
defined by this International Standard. Designers of the system should publish details of the constructs
that are supported.
The focus of this International Standard is the exchange and mediation of structured information. It
does not require the interpretation of unstructured (free text) information into a structured, logical
form. Unstructured information is supported, but falls outside the scope of conformance considerations.
Any documentation system will be deemed conformant with this International Standard, regardless
of the internal data structures it uses; if a deterministic logical algorithm can be constructed, that
transforms data contained in the system into a directly compatible form without loss of meaning.
No assumptions are made as to the nature of this algorithm. “Without loss of meaning” signifies that
designers and users of the system are satisfied that the data representation corresponds to the semantic
definitions provided by this International Standard.
3 Terms and definitions
For the purposes of this document, the following terms and definitions apply.
3.1
class
category of items that share one or more common traits
Note 1 to entry: Class traits serve as criteria to identify items that belong to the class. These traits need not be
explicitly formulated in logical terms, but can be described in a text (called a scope note) that refers to a common
conceptualization of domain experts. The sum of these traits is called the intension of the class. A class can be the
domain or range of none, one, or more properties formally defined in a model. The formally defined properties
need not be part of the intension of their domains or ranges; such properties are optional. An item that belongs
to a class is called an instance of this class. A class is associated with an open set of real-life instances known as
the extension of the class. Here, “open” is used in the sense that it is generally beyond our capabilities to know
all instances of a class in the world and, indeed, that the future can bring new instances into being at any time
(open world). Therefore, a class cannot be defined by enumerating its instances. A class plays a role analogous to
a grammatical noun, and can be completely defined without reference to any other construct (unlike properties,
which need to have an unambiguously defined domain and range). For example, “Person” is a class. A “Person” can
have the property of being a member of a “Group”, but this is not a necessary condition for being a “Person”. We
will never know all “Persons” who have lived in the past, and there will be more “Persons” in the future. Classes
are usually organized as a class hierarchy. The relationship between a subclass and its superclass is known as the
IsA relationship (a concatenation of the words “is a”). For example, a ship IsA vehicle.
3.2
complement
〈of a class A〉 set of all instances of its superclass, B, that are not instances of class A
Note 1 to entry: In terms of set theory, the complement of a class is the extension of the superclass minus the
extension of the class. Compatible extensions of this International Standard need not declare any class as the
complement of one or more other classes. To do so would violate the goal of describing an open world. For example,
for all possible cases of human gender, “male” need not be declared as the complement of “female” or vice versa.
3.3
disjoint
having no common instances in any possible world
Note 1 to entry: Classes are disjoint if the intersection of their extensions is necessarily an empty set.
2 © ISO 2014 – All rights reserved
---------------------- Page: 7 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(E)
Note 2 to entry: See also 5.4.
3.4
domain
class for which a property is formally defined
Note 1 to entry: Instances of a property are applicable to instances of its domain class. A property needs
to have exactly one domain, though the domain class can always contain instances for which the property is
not instantiated. The domain class is analogous to the grammatical subject of a phrase while the property is
analogous to the verb. Which class is selected as the domain and which as the range is arbitrary, as is the choice
between active or passive voice. Property names in ISO 21127 are designed to be semantically meaningful and
grammatically correct when read from domain to range. The inverse property name, given in parentheses, is also
designed to be semantically meaningful and grammatically correct when read from range to domain.
3.5
extension
set of all real life instances belonging to a class that fulfil the criteria of its intension
Note 1 to entry: The extension of a class is an “open” set in the sense that it is generally beyond our capabilities
to know all instances of a class in the world. The future can bring new instances into being at any time (open
world). An information system can, at any point in time, refer to some instances of a class, which form a subset of
its extension.
Note 2 to entry: See also 5.6.
3.6
inheritance
duplication of properties from a class to its subclasses
Note 1 to entry: Inheritance of properties from superclasses to subclasses entails that if an item x is an instance
of a class A, then all properties that need hold for the instances of any of the superclasses of A need also hold for
item x, and that all optional properties that can hold for the instances of any of the superclasses of A can also hold
for item x.
3.7
instance
item having properties that meet the criteria of the intension of the class
Note 1 to entry: “The Mona Lisa” is an instance of the class of E22 Man-Made Object. An instance of a property is
a factual relation between an instance of the domain and an instance of the range of the property that matches
the criteria of the intension of the property. For example, “the Louvre is current owner of the Mona Lisa” is an
instance of the property “is current owner of”. One aspect of the open world assumption is that the number of
class instances declared in a given information system is usually less than the total number of instances in the
real world. You, for example, are an instance of “person”, but you are not mentioned in all information systems
describing “persons”.
3.8
intension
intended meaning of a class
Note 1 to entry: The intension of a class consists of one or more common traits shared by all instances of the class.
These need not be explicitly formulated in logical terms, but can simply be described in a text (a scope note) that
refers to a conceptualization shared by domain experts.
3.9
interoperability
capability of different information systems to communicate some of their contents
Note 1 to entry: Interoperability can imply that
a) two systems can exchange information, and/or
b) multiple systems can be accessed with a single method.
© ISO 2014 – All rights reserved 3
---------------------- Page: 8 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(E)
Note 2 to entry: Generally, syntactic interoperability is distinguished from semantic interoperability. Syntactic
interoperability means that the information encoding and the access protocols of the relevant systems are
compatible, so that information can be processed as described above without error. However, syntactic
interoperability alone does not ensure that each system processes the data in a manner consistent with the
intended meaning. For example, one system may contain a table called “actor” while another system uses the
name “agent”. Even if data from the two tables can be combined in a common data format, it will nonetheless
remain separated unless the semantic equivalence of the two tables is established. Semantic interoperability
requires more than compatible data formats. ISO 21127 presupposes existing syntactic interoperability and is
concerned only with adding semantic interoperability.
3.10
monotonic
〈of a knowledge base〉 having a set of conclusions derived through inference rules that does not reduce,
irrespective of whatever additional propositions can be inserted
Note 1 to entry: Monotonic reasoning is a term derived from knowledge representation. In practical terms,
as experts enter correct statements to an information system, the system need not regard any of the existing
statements as invalid. The ISO 21127 ontology is designed for monotonic reasoning and so enables conflict-free
merging of huge stores of knowledge.
Note 2 to entry: See also 5.1.
3.11
multiple inheritance
possibility for a class to have more than one immediate superclass
Note 1 to entry: The extension of a class with multiple immediate superclasses is a subset of the intersection of all
extensions of its superclasses. The intension of a class with multiple immediate superclasses extends the intensions
of all its superclasses, i.e. its traits are more restrictive than any of its superclasses. If multiple inheritance is used,
the resulting “class hierarchy” is a directed graph and not a tree structure. If it is represented as an indented list,
then some classes will inevitably be repeated at different positions in the hierarchy. For example, “person” is both
an “actor” and a “biological object”.
3.12
open world
assumption that the information stored in a knowledge base is incomplete with respect to the universe
of discourse it aims to describe
Note 1 to entry: A term derived from knowledge representation. The incompleteness of a knowledge base can
be due to the inability of the maintainer to provide sufficient information, or to more fundamental problems of
cognition in the system’s domain. Such problems are characteristic of cultural information systems since our
records about the past are necessarily incomplete. In addition, some items cannot be clearly assigned to a given
class. In particular, the absence of a certain trait for an item described in the system does not necessarily entail
that the item does not possess the trait. For example, if one item is described as “biological object” and another
as “physical object”, this does not imply that the latter is not also a “biological object”. Therefore, complements of
a class with respect to a superclass cannot be derived in general from an information system based on the open
world assumption.
3.13
primitive concept
concept that is declared and for which the meaning is clear, but which cannot be derived from other
concepts
Note 1 to entry: Primitive concept is a term derived from knowledge representation. For example, mother can
be described as a female who has given birth to a child, so mother is not a primitive concept. Event however is a
primitive concept. ISO 21127 is composed primarily of primitive concepts.
4 © ISO 2014 – All rights reserved
---------------------- Page: 9 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(E)
3.14
property
named characteristic of a class to which values can be assigned
Note 1 to entry: A property is characterized by an intension, which is conveyed by a scope note. A property plays
a role analogous to a verb in that it needs to be defined with reference to both a domain and range, which are
analogous to the subject and object in a phrase (unlike classes, which can be defined independently). Which class
is selected as the domain and which as the range, is arbitrary, as is the choice between active and passive voice. In
other words, a property can be interpreted in both directions, with two distinct but related interpretations. For
example, “E24 Physical man-made thing depicts E1 Entity” is equivalent to “E1 Entity is depicted by E24 Physical
man-made thing”. Properties can themselves have properties that relate to other classes (This feature is used in
this model only in order to describe dynamic subtyping of properties.) Properties can also be specialized in the
same manner as classes, resulting in IsA relationships between subproperties and their superproperties.
3.15
query
request for information from an information system expressed so that the response can be calculated
automatically
3.16
query containment
query X contains another query Y if, for each possible population of a database, the answer set to query X
also contains the answer set to query Y
Note 1 to entry: If query X and Y were classes, then X would be a superclass of Y.
3.17
range
class that comprises all the potential values of a property
Note 1 to entry: The value of a property at a given time is an instance of the class assigned as the range of the
property. A property is intended to have exactly one range class. A rough analogy can be drawn between the
subject-verb-object structure of a basic proposition and the domain-property-range structure defined in the
standard. The range class corresponds to the grammatical object. Which class is selected as domain, and which as
range, is arbitrary, as is the choice between active and passive voice. Property names in ISO 21127 are designed
to be semantically meaningful and grammatically correct when read from domain to range. The inverse property
name, given in parentheses, is designed to be semantically meaningful and grammatically correct when read
from range to domain.
3.18
scope note
textual description of the intension of a class or property
Note 1 to entry: Scope notes are not formal modelling constructs but are provided to help explain the intended
meaning and application of the classes and properties. Basically, they refer to a conceptualization shared by domain
experts and disambiguate different possible interpretations. Illustra
...
SLOVENSKI STANDARD
SIST ISO 21127:2017
01-februar-2017
,QIRUPDWLNDLQGRNXPHQWDFLMD5HIHUHQþQDRQWRORJLMD]DL]PHQMDYRLQIRUPDFLMR
NXOWXUQLGHGLãþLQL
Information and documentation -- A reference ontology for the interchange of cultural
heritage information
Information et documentation -- Une ontologie de référence pour l'échange
d'informations du patrimoine culturel
Ta slovenski standard je istoveten z: ISO 21127:2014
ICS:
35.240.99 8SRUDEQLãNHUHãLWYH,7QD IT applications in other fields
GUXJLKSRGURþMLK
97.195 8PHWQLãNLLQREUWQLãNLL]GHONL Items of art and handicrafts.
.XOWXUQHGREULQHLQNXOWXUQD Cultural property and
GHGLãþLQD heritage
SIST ISO 21127:2017 en
2003-01.Slovenski inštitut za standardizacijo. Razmnoževanje celote ali delov tega standarda ni dovoljeno.
---------------------- Page: 1 ----------------------
SIST ISO 21127:2017
---------------------- Page: 2 ----------------------
SIST ISO 21127:2017
INTERNATIONAL ISO
STANDARD 21127
Second edition
2014-10-15
Information and documentation — A
reference ontology for the interchange
of cultural heritage information
Information et documentation — Une ontologie de référence pour
l’échange d’informations du patrimoine culturel
Reference number
ISO 21127:2014(E)
©
ISO 2014
---------------------- Page: 3 ----------------------
SIST ISO 21127:2017
ISO 21127:2014(E)
COPYRIGHT PROTECTED DOCUMENT
© ISO 2014
All rights reserved. Unless otherwise specified, no part of this publication may be reproduced or utilized otherwise in any form
or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, or posting on the internet or an intranet, without prior
written permission. Permission can be requested from either ISO at the address below or ISO’s member body in the country of
the requester.
ISO copyright office
Case postale 56 • CH-1211 Geneva 20
Tel. + 41 22 749 01 11
Fax + 41 22 749 09 47
E-mail copyright@iso.org
Web www.iso.org
Published in Switzerland
ii © ISO 2014 – All rights reserved
---------------------- Page: 4 ----------------------
SIST ISO 21127:2017
ISO 21127:2014(E)
Contents Page
Foreword .iv
Introduction .v
1 Scope . 1
2 Conformance . 1
3 Terms and definitions . 2
4 Structure and presentation . 6
4.1 Property quantifiers . 6
4.2 Naming conventions . 8
5 Modelling principles . 9
5.1 Monotonicity . 9
5.2 Minimality . 9
5.3 Shortcuts . 9
5.4 Disjointness .10
5.5 Types.10
5.6 Extensions .11
5.7 Coverage of intended scope .11
6 Class declarations .12
7 Property declarations .54
Annex A (informative) Class hierarchy .98
Bibliography .104
© ISO 2014 – All rights reserved iii
---------------------- Page: 5 ----------------------
SIST ISO 21127:2017
ISO 21127:2014(E)
Foreword
ISO (the International Organization for Standardization) is a worldwide federation of national standards
bodies (ISO member bodies). The work of preparing International Standards is normally carried out
through ISO technical committees. Each member body interested in a subject for which a technical
committee has been established has the right to be represented on that committee. International
organizations, governmental and non-governmental, in liaison with ISO, also take part in the work.
ISO collaborates closely with the International Electrotechnical Commission (IEC) on all matters of
electrotechnical standardization.
The procedures used to develop this document and those intended for its further maintenance are
described in the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 1. In particular the different approval criteria needed for the
different types of ISO documents should be noted. This document was drafted in accordance with the
editorial rules of the ISO/IEC Directives, Part 2 (see www.iso.org/directives).
Attention is drawn to the possibility that some of the elements of this document may be the subject of
patent rights. ISO shall not be held responsible for identifying any or all such patent rights. Details of
any patent rights identified during the development of the document will be in the Introduction and/or
on the ISO list of patent declarations received (see www.iso.org/patents).
Any trade name used in this document is information given for the convenience of users and does not
constitute an endorsement.
For an explanation on the meaning of ISO specific terms and expressions related to conformity
assessment, as well as information about ISO’s adherence to the WTO principles in the Technical Barriers
to Trade (TBT) see the following URL: Foreword - Supplementary information
The committee responsible for this document is ISO/TC 46, Information and documentation, Subcommittee
SC 4, Technical interoperability, in collaboration with the International Council of Museums Committee
for Documentation (ICOM CIDOC).
This second edition cancels and replaces the first edition (ISO 21127:2006), which has been technically
revised.
iv © ISO 2014 – All rights reserved
---------------------- Page: 6 ----------------------
SIST ISO 21127:2017
ISO 21127:2014(E)
Introduction
This International Standard is the culmination of more than a decade of standards development work
by the International Committee for Documentation (CIDOC) of the International Council of Museums
(ICOM). Work on this International Standard began in 1996 under the auspices of the ICOM-CIDOC
1)
Documentation Standards Working Group. The document provided by CIDOC formed the basis for
ISO 21127 which was first published in 2006. While the initial impetus for the work came from the
museum community, it has since spread to encompass other types of cultural heritage institution. This
International Standard has been appropriated and extended to meet the needs of other institutions
dealing with cultural heritage.
The primary purpose of this International Standard is to offer a conceptual basis for the mediation
of information between cultural heritage organizations such as museums, libraries, and archives.
This International Standard aims to provide a common reference point against which divergent and
incompatible sources of information can be compared and, ultimately, harmonized.
2)
[1]
ISO 21127 is an ontology for cultural heritage information: a formal representation of the conceptual
scheme, or “world view”, underlying the database applications and documentation systems that are used
by cultural heritage institutions. It is important to note that this International Standard aims to clarify
the logic of what cultural heritage institutions do in fact document; it is not intended as a normative
specification of what they should document. The primary role of this International Standard is to enable
information exchange and integration between heterogeneous sources of cultural heritage information.
It aims to provide the semantic definitions and clarifications needed to transform disparate, localized
information sources into a coherent global resource, be it within an institution, an intranet, or on the
Internet.
The specific aims of this International Standard are to
— serve as a common language for domain experts and IT developers when formulating requirements,
— serve as a formal language for the identification of common information contents in different data
formats; in particular to support the implementation of automatic data transformation algorithms
from local to global data structures without loss of meaning. These transformation algorithms are
useful for data exchange, data migration from legacy systems, data information integration, and
mediation of heterogeneous sources,
— support associative queries against integrated resources by providing a global model of the basic
classes and their associations to formulate such queries, and
— provide developers of information systems with a guide to good practice in conceptual modelling.
The ISO 21127 ontology is expressed as a series of interrelated concepts with definitions. This
presentation is similar to that used for a thesaurus. However, the ontology is not intended as a terminology
standard and does not set out to define the terms that are typically used as data in cultural heritage
documentation. Although the presentation provided here is complete, it is an intentionally compact
and concise presentation of the ontology’s 86 classes and 137 unique properties. It does not attempt
to articulate the inheritance of properties by subclasses throughout the class hierarchy (this would
require the declaration of several thousand properties, as opposed to 137). However, this definition
does contain all the information needed to infer and automatically generate a full declaration of all
properties, including inherited properties.
1) The CIDOC CRM Special Interest Group continues to maintain a version of this original document, usually
known as the “CIDOC Conceptual Reference Model” or CIDOC CRM.
2) In the sense used in computer science, i.e. it describes in a formal language the relevant explicit and implicit
concepts and the relationships between them.
© ISO 2014 – All rights reserved v
---------------------- Page: 7 ----------------------
SIST ISO 21127:2017
---------------------- Page: 8 ----------------------
SIST ISO 21127:2017
INTERNATIONAL STANDARD ISO 21127:2014(E)
Information and documentation — A reference ontology
for the interchange of cultural heritage information
1 Scope
This International Standard establishes guidelines for the exchange of information between cultural
heritage institutions. In simple terms, this can be defined as the information managed by museums,
libraries, and archives.
A more detailed definition can be articulated by defining both the intended scope, a broad and maximally
inclusive definition of general principles, and the practical scope, which is defined by reference to a set
of specific museum documentation standards and practices.
The intended scope of this International Standard is defined as the exchange and integration of
heterogeneous scientific documentation relating to museum collections. This definition requires further
elaboration.
— The term “scientific documentation” is intended to convey the requirement that the depth and quality
of descriptive information that can be handled by this International Standard need to be sufficient
for serious academic research. This does not mean that information intended for presentation to
members of the general public is excluded, but rather that this International Standard is intended
to provide the level of detail and precision expected and required by museum professionals and
researchers in the field.
— The term “museum collections” is intended to cover all types of material collected and displayed
3)
by museums and related institutions, as defined by ICOM . This includes collections, sites, and
monuments relating to fields such as social history, ethnography, archaeology, fine and applied arts,
natural history, history of sciences and technology.
— The documentation of collections includes the detailed description of individual items within
collections, groups of items, and collections as a whole. This International Standard is specifically
intended to cover contextual information (i.e. the historical, geographical, and theoretical
background that gives museum collections much of their cultural significance and value).
— The exchange of relevant information with libraries and archives, and harmonization with their
models, falls within the intended scope of this International Standard.
— Information required solely for the administration and management of cultural institutions, such as
information relating to personnel, accounting, and visitor statistics, falls outside the intended scope
of this International Standard.
4)
The practical scope of this International Standard is the set of reference standards for museum
documentation that have been used to guide and validate its development. This International Standard
covers the same domain of discourse as the union of these reference documents; consequently, for any
data that is correctly encoded in accordance with any of these reference documents, a form of encoding
can be created that is both compatible with the current standard and which entails no semantic loss.
2 Conformance
Users intending to take advantage of the semantic interoperability offered by this International Standard
should ensure conformance with the relevant data structures. Conformance pertains either to data
3) The ICOM Statutes provide a definition of the term “museum” at .
4) The practical scope of the CIDOC CRM, including a list of the relevant museum documentation standards, is
discussed in more detail on the CIDOC CRM website at < http://cidoc-crm.org/scope.html >.
© ISO 2014 – All rights reserved 1
---------------------- Page: 9 ----------------------
SIST ISO 21127:2017
ISO 21127:2014(E)
to be made accessible in an integrated environment or intended for transport to other environments.
Any encoding of data in a formal language that preserves the relations of the classes, properties, and
inheritance rules defined by this International Standard, is regarded as conformant.
Conformance with this International Standard does not require complete matching of all local
documentation structures, nor that all concepts and structures present in this International Standard
be implemented. This International Standard is intended to allow room both for extensions, needed
to capture the full richness of cultural information, and for simplification, in the interests of economy.
A system will be deemed partially conformant if it supports a subset of subclasses and subproperties
defined by this International Standard. Designers of the system should publish details of the constructs
that are supported.
The focus of this International Standard is the exchange and mediation of structured information. It
does not require the interpretation of unstructured (free text) information into a structured, logical
form. Unstructured information is supported, but falls outside the scope of conformance considerations.
Any documentation system will be deemed conformant with this International Standard, regardless
of the internal data structures it uses; if a deterministic logical algorithm can be constructed, that
transforms data contained in the system into a directly compatible form without loss of meaning.
No assumptions are made as to the nature of this algorithm. “Without loss of meaning” signifies that
designers and users of the system are satisfied that the data representation corresponds to the semantic
definitions provided by this International Standard.
3 Terms and definitions
For the purposes of this document, the following terms and definitions apply.
3.1
class
category of items that share one or more common traits
Note 1 to entry: Class traits serve as criteria to identify items that belong to the class. These traits need not be
explicitly formulated in logical terms, but can be described in a text (called a scope note) that refers to a common
conceptualization of domain experts. The sum of these traits is called the intension of the class. A class can be the
domain or range of none, one, or more properties formally defined in a model. The formally defined properties
need not be part of the intension of their domains or ranges; such properties are optional. An item that belongs
to a class is called an instance of this class. A class is associated with an open set of real-life instances known as
the extension of the class. Here, “open” is used in the sense that it is generally beyond our capabilities to know
all instances of a class in the world and, indeed, that the future can bring new instances into being at any time
(open world). Therefore, a class cannot be defined by enumerating its instances. A class plays a role analogous to
a grammatical noun, and can be completely defined without reference to any other construct (unlike properties,
which need to have an unambiguously defined domain and range). For example, “Person” is a class. A “Person” can
have the property of being a member of a “Group”, but this is not a necessary condition for being a “Person”. We
will never know all “Persons” who have lived in the past, and there will be more “Persons” in the future. Classes
are usually organized as a class hierarchy. The relationship between a subclass and its superclass is known as the
IsA relationship (a concatenation of the words “is a”). For example, a ship IsA vehicle.
3.2
complement
〈of a class A〉 set of all instances of its superclass, B, that are not instances of class A
Note 1 to entry: In terms of set theory, the complement of a class is the extension of the superclass minus the
extension of the class. Compatible extensions of this International Standard need not declare any class as the
complement of one or more other classes. To do so would violate the goal of describing an open world. For example,
for all possible cases of human gender, “male” need not be declared as the complement of “female” or vice versa.
3.3
disjoint
having no common instances in any possible world
Note 1 to entry: Classes are disjoint if the intersection of their extensions is necessarily an empty set.
2 © ISO 2014 – All rights reserved
---------------------- Page: 10 ----------------------
SIST ISO 21127:2017
ISO 21127:2014(E)
Note 2 to entry: See also 5.4.
3.4
domain
class for which a property is formally defined
Note 1 to entry: Instances of a property are applicable to instances of its domain class. A property needs
to have exactly one domain, though the domain class can always contain instances for which the property is
not instantiated. The domain class is analogous to the grammatical subject of a phrase while the property is
analogous to the verb. Which class is selected as the domain and which as the range is arbitrary, as is the choice
between active or passive voice. Property names in ISO 21127 are designed to be semantically meaningful and
grammatically correct when read from domain to range. The inverse property name, given in parentheses, is also
designed to be semantically meaningful and grammatically correct when read from range to domain.
3.5
extension
set of all real life instances belonging to a class that fulfil the criteria of its intension
Note 1 to entry: The extension of a class is an “open” set in the sense that it is generally beyond our capabilities
to know all instances of a class in the world. The future can bring new instances into being at any time (open
world). An information system can, at any point in time, refer to some instances of a class, which form a subset of
its extension.
Note 2 to entry: See also 5.6.
3.6
inheritance
duplication of properties from a class to its subclasses
Note 1 to entry: Inheritance of properties from superclasses to subclasses entails that if an item x is an instance
of a class A, then all properties that need hold for the instances of any of the superclasses of A need also hold for
item x, and that all optional properties that can hold for the instances of any of the superclasses of A can also hold
for item x.
3.7
instance
item having properties that meet the criteria of the intension of the class
Note 1 to entry: “The Mona Lisa” is an instance of the class of E22 Man-Made Object. An instance of a property is
a factual relation between an instance of the domain and an instance of the range of the property that matches
the criteria of the intension of the property. For example, “the Louvre is current owner of the Mona Lisa” is an
instance of the property “is current owner of”. One aspect of the open world assumption is that the number of
class instances declared in a given information system is usually less than the total number of instances in the
real world. You, for example, are an instance of “person”, but you are not mentioned in all information systems
describing “persons”.
3.8
intension
intended meaning of a class
Note 1 to entry: The intension of a class consists of one or more common traits shared by all instances of the class.
These need not be explicitly formulated in logical terms, but can simply be described in a text (a scope note) that
refers to a conceptualization shared by domain experts.
3.9
interoperability
capability of different information systems to communicate some of their contents
Note 1 to entry: Interoperability can imply that
a) two systems can exchange information, and/or
b) multiple systems can be accessed with a single method.
© ISO 2014 – All rights reserved 3
---------------------- Page: 11 ----------------------
SIST ISO 21127:2017
ISO 21127:2014(E)
Note 2 to entry: Generally, syntactic interoperability is distinguished from semantic interoperability. Syntactic
interoperability means that the information encoding and the access protocols of the relevant systems are
compatible, so that information can be processed as described above without error. However, syntactic
interoperability alone does not ensure that each system processes the data in a manner consistent with the
intended meaning. For example, one system may contain a table called “actor” while another system uses the
name “agent”. Even if data from the two tables can be combined in a common data format, it will nonetheless
remain separated unless the semantic equivalence of the two tables is established. Semantic interoperability
requires more than compatible data formats. ISO 21127 presupposes existing syntactic interoperability and is
concerned only with adding semantic interoperability.
3.10
monotonic
〈of a knowledge base〉 having a set of conclusions derived through inference rules that does not reduce,
irrespective of whatever additional propositions can be inserted
Note 1 to entry: Monotonic reasoning is a term derived from knowledge representation. In practical terms,
as experts enter correct statements to an information system, the system need not regard any of the existing
statements as invalid. The ISO 21127 ontology is designed for monotonic reasoning and so enables conflict-free
merging of huge stores of knowledge.
Note 2 to entry: See also 5.1.
3.11
multiple inheritance
possibility for a class to have more than one immediate superclass
Note 1 to entry: The extension of a class with multiple immediate superclasses is a subset of the intersection of all
extensions of its superclasses. The intension of a class with multiple immediate superclasses extends the intensions
of all its superclasses, i.e. its traits are more restrictive than any of its superclasses. If multiple inheritance is used,
the resulting “class hierarchy” is a directed graph and not a tree structure. If it is represented as an indented list,
then some classes will inevitably be repeated at different positions in the hierarchy. For example, “person” is both
an “actor” and a “biological object”.
3.12
open world
assumption that the information stored in a knowledge base is incomplete with respect to the universe
of discourse it aims to describe
Note 1 to entry: A term derived from knowledge representation. The incompleteness of a knowledge base can
be due to the inability of the maintainer to provide sufficient information, or to more fundamental problems of
cognition in the system’s domain. Such problems are characteristic of cultural information systems since our
records about the past are necessarily incomplete. In addition, some items cannot be clearly assigned to a given
class. In particular, the absence of a certain trait for an item described in the system does not necessarily entail
that the item does not possess the trait. For example, if one item is described as “biological object” and another
as “physical object”, this does not imply that the latter is not also a “biological object”. Therefore, complements of
a class with respect to a superclass cannot be derived in general from an information system based on the open
world assumption.
3.13
primitive concept
concept that is declared and for which the meaning is clear, but which cannot be derived from other
concepts
Note 1 to entry: Primitive concept is a term derived from knowledge representation. For example, mother can
be described as a female who has given birth to a child, so mother is not a primitive concept. Event however is a
primitive concept. ISO 21127 is composed primarily of primitive concepts.
4 © ISO 2014 – All rights reserved
---------------------- Page: 12 ----------------------
SIST ISO 21127:2017
ISO 21127:2014(E)
3.14
property
named characteristic of a class to which values can be assigned
Note 1 to entry: A property is characterized by an intension, which is conveyed by a scope note. A property plays
a role analogous to a verb in that it needs to be defined with reference to both a domain and range, which are
analogous to the subject and object in a phrase (unlike classes, which can be defined independently). Which class
is selected as the domain and which as the range, is arbitrary, as is the choice between active and passive voice. In
other words, a property can be interpreted in both directions, with two distinct but related interpretations. For
example, “E24 Physical man-made thing depicts E1 Entity” is equivalent to “E1 Entity is depicted by E24 Physical
man-made thing”. Properties can themselves have properties that relate to other classes (This feature is used in
this model only in order to describe dynamic subtyping of properties.) Properties can also be specialized in the
same manner as classes, resulting in IsA relationships between subproperties and their superproperties.
3.15
query
request for information from an information system expressed so that the response can be calculated
automatically
3.16
query containment
query X contains another query Y if, for each possible population of a database, the answer set to query X
also contains the answer set to query Y
Note 1 to entry: If query X and Y were classes, then X would be a superclass of Y.
3.17
range
clas
...
NORME ISO
INTERNATIONALE 21127
Deuxième édition
2014-10-15
Information et documentation — Une
ontologie de référence pour l’échange
d’informations du patrimoine culturel
Information and documentation — A reference ontology for the
interchange of cultural heritage information
Numéro de référence
ISO 21127:2014(F)
©
ISO 2014
---------------------- Page: 1 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(F)
DOCUMENT PROTÉGÉ PAR COPYRIGHT
© ISO 2014
Droits de reproduction réservés. Sauf indication contraire, aucune partie de cette publication ne peut être reproduite ni utilisée
sous quelque forme que ce soit et par aucun procédé, électronique ou mécanique, y compris la photocopie, l’affichage sur
l’internet ou sur un Intranet, sans autorisation écrite préalable. Les demandes d’autorisation peuvent être adressées à l’ISO à
l’adresse ci-après ou au comité membre de l’ISO dans le pays du demandeur.
ISO copyright office
Case postale 56 • CH-1211 Geneva 20
Tel. + 41 22 749 01 11
Fax + 41 22 749 09 47
E-mail copyright@iso.org
Web www.iso.org
Publié en Suisse
ii © ISO 2014 – Tous droits réservés
---------------------- Page: 2 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(F)
Sommaire Page
Avant-propos .iv
Introduction .v
1 Domaine d’application . 1
2 Conformité . 2
3 Termes et définitions . 2
4 Structure et présentation . 7
4.1 Quantificateurs des propriétés . 7
4.2 Conventions de nommage . 9
5 Principes de modélisation .10
5.1 Monotonicité .10
5.2 Minimalité .10
5.3 Raccourcis .10
5.4 Classes disjointes .11
5.5 Types.11
5.6 Extensions .13
5.7 Couverture du domaine d’application envisagé .13
6 Déclaration des classes .13
7 Déclaration des propriétés .61
Annexe A (informative) Hiérarchie des classes .108
Bibliographie .114
© ISO 2014 – Tous droits réservés iii
---------------------- Page: 3 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(F)
Avant-propos
L’ISO (Organisation internationale de normalisation) est une fédération mondiale d’organismes
nationaux de normalisation (comités membres de l’ISO). L’élaboration des Normes internationales est
en général confiée aux comités techniques de l’ISO. Chaque comité membre intéressé par une étude
a le droit de faire partie du comité technique créé à cet effet. Les organisations internationales,
gouvernementales et non gouvernementales, en liaison avec l’ISO participent également aux travaux.
L’ISO collabore étroitement avec la Commission électrotechnique internationale (IEC) en ce qui concerne
la normalisation électrotechnique.
Les procédures utilisées pour élaborer le présent document et celles destinées à sa mise à jour sont
décrites dans les Directives ISO/IEC, Partie 1. Il convient, en particulier de prendre note des différents
critères d’approbation requis pour les différents types de documents ISO. Le présent document a été
rédigé conformément aux règles de rédaction données dans les Directives ISO/IEC, Partie 2 (voir www.
iso.org/directives).
L’attention est appelée sur le fait que certains des éléments du présent document peuvent faire l’objet de
droits de propriété intellectuelle ou de droits analogues. L’ISO ne saurait être tenue pour responsable
de ne pas avoir identifié de tels droits de propriété et averti de leur existence. Les détails concernant les
références aux droits de propriété intellectuelle ou autres droits analogues identifiés lors de l’élaboration
du document sont indiqués dans l’Introduction et/ou dans la liste des déclarations de brevets reçues par
l’ISO (voir www.iso.org/brevets).
Les appellations commerciales éventuellement mentionnées dans le présent document sont données
pour information, par souci de commodité, à l’intention des utilisateurs et ne sauraient constituer un
engagement.
Pour une explication de la signification des termes et expressions spécifiques de l’ISO liés à l’évaluation de
la conformité, ou pour toute information au sujet de l’adhésion de l’ISO aux principes de l’OMC concernant
les obstacles techniques au commerce (OTC), voir le lien suivant: Avant-propos — Informations
supplémentaires.
Le comité chargé de l’élaboration du présent document est l’ISO/TC 46, Information et documentation,
sous-comité SC 4, Interopérabilité technique, en collaboration avec le Comité pour la Documentation du
Conseil International des Musées (ICOM-CIDOC).
Cette deuxième édition annule et remplace la première édition (ISO 21127:2006), qui a fait l’objet d’une
révision technique.
iv © ISO 2014 – Tous droits réservés
---------------------- Page: 4 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(F)
Introduction
La présente Norme internationale est l’aboutissement de plus d’une décennie de travail de la part du
Comité international pour la Documentation (CIDOC) du Conseil international des musées (ICOM). Le
travail sur la présente Norme internationale a commencé en 1996 sous les auspices du groupe de travail
1)
de l’ICOM-CIDOC sur la normalisation documentaire. Le document fourni par le CIDOC a servi de base
à la norme ISO 21127 publiée pour la première fois en 2006. Si ce travail a reçu son impulsion première
de la communauté muséale, il s’est depuis lors étendu à d’autres types d’institutions patrimoniales.
La présente Norme internationale a été adaptée et augmentée afin de répondre aux besoins d’autres
institutions s’occupant de patrimoine culturel.
L’objectif fondamental de la présente Norme internationale est d’offrir une base conceptuelle
pour l’interopérabilité des informations entre institutions patrimoniales telles que les musées, les
bibliothèques et les archives. L’intention est de fournir un point de référence commun avec lequel
des sources d’informations divergentes et incompatibles peuvent être comparées et, finalement,
harmonisées.
2)
[1]
L’ISO 21127 est une ontologie pour les informations concernant le patrimoine culturel: c’est une
représentation formelle du schéma conceptuel, ou «conception du monde», qui est sous-jacent aux
applications de base de données et aux systèmes de documentation qui sont employés par les institutions
patrimoniales. Il est important de noter que la présente Norme internationale vise à clarifier la logique
de ce que ces institutions documentent en pratique, et non pas à fournir des spécifications normatives
de ce qu’il convient qu’elles documentent. L’objectif fondamental de la présente Norme internationale
est de permettre l’échange et l’intégration d’informations entre sources hétérogènes sur le patrimoine
culturel. Elle vise à fournir les définitions et clarifications sémantiques requises pour transformer des
sources d’informations disparates et locales en une ressource universelle cohérente, que ce soit dans le
contexte d’une institution, d’un intranet ou de l’Internet
Les objectifs spécifiques de la présente Norme internationale sont de:
— servir de langage commun entre experts du domaine et informaticiens, lors de l’élaboration d’un
cahier des charges;
— servir de langage formel pour l’identification du contenu informationnel commun à diverses
sources de données; en particulier pour faciliter l’implémentation d’algorithmes de transformation
automatique de données depuis des structures locales vers des structures universelles sans perte de
signification. Ces algorithmes de transformation sont utiles pour l’échange de données, la migration
de données depuis des systèmes existants, l’intégration des informations et l’interopérabilité de
sources de données hétérogènes;
— permettre l’interrogation associative de ressources intégrées en fournissant un modèle global des
classes de base et de leurs associations pour formuler de telles questions; et
— fournir à des concepteurs de systèmes d’information un guide de bonnes pratiques en modélisation
conceptuelle.
L’ontologie ISO 21127 est exprimée sous la forme d’une série de concepts en relation les uns avec les
autres, accompagnés de leurs définitions. Cette présentation est semblable à celle qui est en usage pour
un thésaurus. Cependant, cette ontologie n’est pas conçue comme une norme terminologique et ne vise
pas à définir les termes habituellement employés comme éléments de données dans la documentation
sur le patrimoine culturel. Bien que la présentation fournie ici soit complète, il s’agit d’une présentation
délibérément compacte et concise des 86 classes et 137 propriétés uniques dont l’ontologie se compose.
Elle ne cherche pas à expliciter sur l’ensemble de la hiérarchie des classes le fait que les sous-classes
héritent les propriétés de leurs super-classes (ce qui nécessiterait de déclarer plusieurs milliers de
1) Le Groupe d’Intérêt spécial pour le CIDOC CRM continue de mettre à jour une version de ce document original,
usuellement dénommé «Modèle conceptuel de référence du CIDOC» ou CIDOC CRM.
2) Dans le sens où le terme est employé en informatique, c’est-à-dire la description dans un langage formel des
concepts explicites et implicites pertinents et des relations qui existent entre eux.
© ISO 2014 – Tous droits réservés v
---------------------- Page: 5 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(F)
propriétés, contre seulement 137). Cependant, cette définition contient bien toute l’information requise
pour inférer et générer automatiquement une déclaration complète de toutes les propriétés, y compris
les propriétés héritées.
vi © ISO 2014 – Tous droits réservés
---------------------- Page: 6 ----------------------
NORME INTERNATIONALE ISO 21127:2014(F)
Information et documentation — Une ontologie de
référence pour l’échange d’informations du patrimoine
culturel
1 Domaine d’application
La présente Norme internationale fixe des lignes directrices pour l’échange d’informations entre
institutions patrimoniales. En termes simples, on peut dire qu’il s’agit de l’information gérée par les
musées, les bibliothèques et les archives.
Une définition plus détaillée peut être formulée en définissant le domaine d’application envisagé, une
définition large et inclusive basée sur des principes généraux, et le domaine d’application pratique, qui
est défini par référence à un ensemble de normes et de pratiques de documentation propres aux musées.
Le domaine d’application visé par la présente Norme internationale porte sur l’échange et l’intégration
de la documentation scientifique hétérogène relative aux collections muséales. Cette définition appelle
un développement.
— Le terme «documentation scientifique» vise à exprimer le fait que les informations descriptives
susceptibles d’être concernées par la présente Norme internationale doivent être d’une exhaustivité
et d’une qualité suffisantes à des fins de recherche universitaire sérieuse. Cela ne signifie pas pour
autant que des informations destinées à être présentées au grand public sont exclues, mais plutôt
que la présente Norme internationale vise à fournir le niveau de détail et de précision attendu et
exigé par les professionnels des musées et les chercheurs du domaine.
— Le terme «collections muséales» vise à recouvrir tous types d’objets rassemblés et exposés par
3)
les musées et institutions apparentées, selon la définition de l’ICOM , ce qui inclut des collections,
des sites et des monuments en lien avec des domaines tels que l’histoire sociale, l’ethnographie,
l’archéologie, les beaux-arts et les arts appliqués, l’histoire naturelle, l’histoire des sciences et des
techniques.
— La documentation des collections comprend la description détaillée d’objets individuels au sein des
collections, de groupes d’objets et des collections considérées comme un tout. La présente Norme
internationale vise spécifiquement à couvrir des informations contextuelles (c’est-à-dire l’arrière-
plan historique, géographique et théorique qui confère aux collections muséales une bonne part de
leur importance et de leur valeur culturelles).
— L’échange des informations pertinentes avec les bibliothèques et les archives et l’harmonisation avec
leurs modèles entre dans le domaine d’application envisagé de la présente Norme internationale.
— Les informations qui ne sont requises que pour l’administration et la gestion des institutions
culturelles, telles que les informations concernant la gestion du personnel, la comptabilité et les
statistiques de fréquentation, échappent au domaine d’application envisagé de la présente Norme
internationale.
4)
Le domaine d’application pratique de la présente Norme internationale est l’ensemble des normes de
référence pour la documentation muséographique qui ont servi à en guider et en valider l’élaboration. La
présente Norme internationale couvre le même domaine de discours que l’ensemble de ces documents
de référence; par conséquent, pour toute donnée correctement encodée selon n’importe lequel de ces
3) Les statuts de l’ICOM offrent une définition du terme «musée» à l’adresse:
html#2>.
4) Le domaine d’application pratique du CIDOC CRM, avec une liste des normes pertinentes en documentation
muséographique, est présenté de façon plus détaillée sur le site Web du CIDOC CRM, à l’adresse
org/scope.html>.
© ISO 2014 – Tous droits réservés 1
---------------------- Page: 7 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(F)
documents de référence, il est possible de créer une forme d’encodage qui soit compatible avec la norme
actuelle et en même temps n’entraîne aucune perte sémantique.
2 Conformité
Il convient que les utilisateurs qui ont l’intention de mettre à profit l’interopérabilité sémantique
offerte par la présente Norme internationale s’assurent de la conformité avec les structures de données
concernées. La conformité porte sur les données à rendre accessibles dans un environnement intégré ou
qui sont destinées à être transférées vers d’autres environnements. Tout encodage de données dans un
langage formel qui préserve les relations entre les classes, les propriétés et les règles d’héritage définies
par la présente Norme internationale, est considéré comme conforme.
La conformité à la présente Norme internationale n’exige ni une correspondance complète de toutes les
structures de documentation locales, ni que tous les concepts et les structures définis par la présente
Norme internationale soient mis en œuvre. La présente Norme internationale est élaborée pour
permettre les extensions nécessaires pour recouvrir toute la richesse des informations culturelles,
aussi bien que les simplifications, pour des raisons d’économie. Un système sera considéré comme
partiellement conforme s’il prend en compte un sous-ensemble de classes et de propriétés définies par
la présente Norme internationale. Il convient que les concepteurs du système publient les détails des
éléments qui sont pris en compte.
La présente Norme internationale se concentre sur l’échange et l’interopérabilité d’informations
structurées. Elle ne contraint pas à transformer des informations non structurées (en texte libre) en un
formalisme structuré et logique. Les informations en texte libre sont prises en compte, mais n’entrent
pas dans le champ d’application de ces considérations sur la conformité.
Tout système de documentation sera jugé conforme à la présente Norme internationale, indépendamment
de la structure interne de données qu’il emploie, s’il est possible de construire un algorithme logique
déterministe qui fait passer les données contenues dans le système à un formalisme directement
compatible sans perte de signification. Aucune supposition n’est faite quant à la nature de cet algorithme.
On entend par «sans perte de signification» le fait que les concepteurs et les utilisateurs du système
sont satisfaits de la correspondance de la représentation des données avec les définitions sémantiques
fournies par la présente Norme internationale.
3 Termes et définitions
Pour les besoins du présent document, les termes et définitions suivants s’appliquent.
3.1
classe
catégorie d’entités qui partagent un ou plusieurs traits communs
Note 1 à l’article: Les traits d’une classe servent de critères pour l’identification des entités qui appartiennent
à cette classe. Ces traits n’ont pas besoin d’être explicitement formulés en termes logiques, mais peuvent être
décrits dans un texte (appelé ici une note d’application) qui fait référence à une conceptualisation commune aux
experts du domaine. La somme de ces traits est appelée l’intension de la classe. Une classe peut être le domaine
ou le codomaine de zéro, une seule ou plusieurs propriétés formellement définies dans un modèle. Les propriétés
formellement définies n’ont pas besoin de faire partie de l’intension de leur domaine ou de leur codomaine; de telles
propriétés sont facultatives. Une entité qui appartient à une classe est appelée une instance de cette classe. Une
classe est associée à un ensemble ouvert d’instances réelles, qui constituent l’extension de la classe. Ici, le terme
«ouvert» signifie que nous n’avons généralement pas la possibilité de connaître toutes les instances d’une classe
qui existent dans le monde, et qu’en fait il peut toujours apparaître de nouvelles instances dans l’avenir (notion
de monde ouvert). Une classe ne peut donc être définie par l’énumération de ses instances. Une classe joue un
rôle analogue à un substantif en grammaire, et peut être complètement définie sans faire référence à aucun autre
élément (à la différence des propriétés, qui doivent nécessairement avoir un domaine et un codomaine définis sans
ambiguïté). Par exemple, «Personne» est une classe. Une «Personne» peut avoir pour propriété d’être membre d’un
«Groupe», mais il ne s’agit pas là d’une condition nécessaire pour être une «Personne». Nous ne saurons jamais qui
sont toutes les «Personnes» qui ont vécu dans le passé, et de nouvelles «Personnes» apparaîtront dans l’avenir. Les
classes sont habituellement organisées en une hiérarchie de classes. La relation entre une sous-classe et sa super-
classe est appelée relation EstUn (la concaténation des mots «est un»). Par exemple, un bateau EstUn véhicule.
2 © ISO 2014 – Tous droits réservés
---------------------- Page: 8 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(F)
3.2
complément
〈d’une classe A〉 ensemble de toutes les instances de sa super-classe, B, qui ne sont pas des instances de A
Note 1 à l’article: Au sens de la théorie des ensembles, le complément d’une classe est l’extension de la super-
classe moins l’extension de la classe. Les extensions compatibles de la présente Norme internationale n’ont
pas besoin de déclarer une classe en tant que complément d’une ou de plusieurs autres classes. Cela entrerait
en contradiction avec l’objectif de décrire un monde ouvert. Par exemple, pour rendre compte de tous les cas
possibles d’appartenance d’un être humain à un sexe, il n’est pas nécessaire de déclarer «mâle» comme étant le
complément de «femelle» ou vice versa.
3.3
classes disjointes
n’ayant pas d’instances communes dans aucun monde possible
Note 1 à l’article: Deux classes sont disjointes si l’intersection de leurs extensions est nécessairement un ensemble
vide.
Note 2 à l’article: Voir aussi 5.4.
3.4
domaine
classe pour laquelle une propriété est formellement définie
Note 1 à l’article: Les instances d’une propriété sont applicables aux instances de sa classe de domaine. Une
propriété doit avoir exactement un domaine, bien que la classe de domaine puisse toujours contenir des instances
pour lesquelles la propriété n’est pas instanciée. La classe de domaine est analogue au sujet grammatical d’une
phrase, tandis que la propriété est analogue au verbe. La décision de déclarer telle classe comme domaine et telle
classe comme codomaine est arbitraire, de même que pour une phrase le choix entre voix active et voix passive est
arbitraire. Les noms des propriétés dans la norme ISO 21127 sont conçus pour être sémantiquement significatifs
et grammaticalement corrects [dans la version anglaise] quand ils sont lus du domaine vers le codomaine. Le nom
de propriété inverse, donné entre parenthèses, est également conçu pour être sémantiquement significatif et
grammaticalement correct [dans la version anglaise] quand il est lu du codomaine vers le domaine.
3.5
extension
ensemble de toutes les instances réelles d’une classe qui remplissent les critères de son intension
Note 1 à l’article: L’extension d’une classe est un ensemble «ouvert», en ce sens qu’il est, en général, impossible de
connaître toutes les instances d’une classe dans le monde. Il peut toujours apparaître de nouvelles instances dans
l’avenir (notion de monde ouvert). Un système d’information peut à tout instant ne faire référence qu’à quelques
instances d’une classe, qui forment un sous-ensemble de son extension.
Note 2 à l’article: Voir aussi 5.6.
3.6
héritage
duplication des propriétés d’une classe vers ses sous-classes
Note 1 à l’article: L’héritage de propriétés de super-classes vers les sous-classes implique que si une entité x est une
instance d’une classe A, alors toutes les propriétés qui doivent s’appliquer aux instances de n’importe laquelle des
super-classes de A doivent également s’appliquer à l’entité x, et que toutes les propriétés facultatives qui peuvent
s’appliquer aux instances de n’importe laquelle des super-classes de A peuvent également s’appliquer à l’entité x.
© ISO 2014 – Tous droits réservés 3
---------------------- Page: 9 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(F)
3.7
instance
entité ayant des propriétés qui remplissent les critères de l’intension de la classe
Note 1 à l’article: «La Joconde» est une instance de la classe E22 Objet Fabriqué. Une instance d’une propriété est
une relation factuelle entre une instance du domaine et une instance du codomaine de la propriété qui remplit
les critères de l’intension de la propriété. Par exemple, «le Louvre est propriétaire actuel de la Joconde» est une
instance de la propriété «est propriétaire actuel de». Il entre dans la définition du postulat de monde ouvert que
le nombre d’instances d’une classe déclarées dans un système d’information donné est habituellement inférieur
au nombre total des instances qui existent dans le monde réel. Par exemple, vous êtes une instance de «personne»,
mais vous ne figurez pas dans tous les systèmes d’information qui décrivent des «personnes».
3.8
intension
signification voulue d’une classe
Note 1 à l’article: L’intension d’une classe consiste en un ou plusieurs traits communs que partagent toutes les
instances de la classe. Ces traits n’ont pas besoin d’être explicitement formulés en termes logiques, mais peuvent
simplement être décrits dans un texte (une note d’application) qui renvoie à une conceptualisation que partagent
les experts du domaine.
3.9
interopérabilité
capacité des systèmes d’information à communiquer une partie de leur contenu
Note 1 à l’article: L’interopérabilité peut impliquer que:
a) deux systèmes peuvent échanger des informations; et/ou
b) on peut accéder à de multiples systèmes par une seule méthode.
Note 2 à l’article: En général, une distinction est établie entre interopérabilité syntaxique et interopérabilité
sémantique. L’interopérabilité syntaxique signifie que l’encodage de l’information et les protocoles d’accès des
systèmes concernés sont compatibles, de sorte que les informations puissent être traitées comme décrit ci-dessus
et sans erreurs. Cependant, l’interopérabilité syntaxique à elle seule ne garantit pas que chaque système traite
les données en cohérence avec la signification voulue. Par exemple, un système peut comporter une table appelée
«acteur» tandis qu’un autre système emploie le mot «agent». Bien que les données issues des deux tables puissent
être combinées dans un format de données commun, elles resteront néanmoins séparées tant que l’équivalence
sémantique de ces deux tables n’aura pas été établie. L’interopérabilité sémantique réclame plus que des formats
de données compatibles. La norme ISO 21127 présuppose l’existence d’une interopérabilité syntaxique et ne
s’occupe que d’y adjoindre une interopérabilité sémantique.
3.10
monotonique
〈d’une base de connaissances〉 ayant un ensemble de conclusions tirées par des règles d’inférence qui ne
diminue jamais, malgré l’addition de propositions supplémentaires
Note 1 à l’article: Le raisonnement monotonique est un terme emprunté à la représentation des connaissances.
En termes pratiques, au fur et à mesure que des experts entrent des déclarations correctes dans un système
d’information, le système n’a besoin de considérer aucune des déclarations préexistantes comme invalide.
L’ontologie de la norme ISO 21127 est conçue pour le raisonnement monotonique et permet donc la fusion sans
conflits de très grands fonds de connaissances.
Note 2 à l’article: Voir aussi 5.1.
4 © ISO 2014 – Tous droits réservés
---------------------- Page: 10 ----------------------
ISO 21127:2014(F)
3.11
héritage multiple
possibilité pour une classe d’avoir plus d’une super-classe directe
Note 1 à l’article: L’extension d’une classe ayant plusieurs super-classes directes est un sous-ensemble de
l’intersection de toutes les extensions de ses super-classes. L’intension d’une classe ayant plusieurs super-classes
directes élargit l’intension de toutes ses super-classes, c’est-à-dire que ses traits sont plus restrictifs que ceux de
n’importe laquelle de ses super-classes. Si l’héritage multiple est utilisé, la «hiérarchie de classes» qui en résulte
est un graphe dirigé et non pas une arborescence. Si elle est représentée sous forme de liste indentée, alors
certaines classes seront nécessairement répétées à différents endroits de la hiérarchie. Par exemple, «Personne»
est à la fois un «Agent» et un «Objet biologique».
3.12
monde ouvert
postulat selon lequel les informations stockées dans une base de connaissances sont incomplètes par
rapport à l’univers de discours qu’elle vise à décrire
Note 1 à l’article: Terme emprunté à la représentation des connaissances. Le caractère incomplet d’une base de
connaissances peut être dû à l’incapacité du gestionnaire à fournir des informations suffisantes, ou à des problèmes
cognitifs plus fondamentaux dans le domaine couvert par le système. De tels problèmes sont caractéristiques de
systèmes d’information culturels, puisque nos archives relatives au passé sont nécessairement incomplètes. De
plus, il peut exister des entités qui ne peuvent pas être assignées sans équivoque à un
...
Questions, Comments and Discussion
Ask us and Technical Secretary will try to provide an answer. You can facilitate discussion about the standard in here.