Using Ontologies of Software: Example of R Functions Management

In a scientific context, making available scientific resources like computer programs is a real challenge for multidisciplinary research teams. In this paper, we propose an ontology-based approach to manage, share, reuse and promote software programs in a research community. Specifically, we were interested in the capitalization of R functions, R being a language for statistics and graphics. We designed an ontology to annotate R functions. We adopted the Semantic Web models: annotations are represented into the Resource Description Framework and the ontology in the Ontology Web Language. In the so-built semantic repository, R functions can be retrieved by expressing semantic queries in the SPARQL language. As a result, we have developed a new kind of software repository with semantic inferences. It is based upon the Corese semantic search engine and accessible through a Web Service. It has been adopted by a multidisciplinary team in life sciences.