Artigo criado para a matéria de tópicos avançados em Engenharia de Software. Mestrado em Ciências da Computação. PROCC UFS

1. OntoAI
Proposal of Ontology to Define Digital TV Interactive Application
Diego Armando de Oliveira Meneses1, Antonio Aliberte de Andrade Machado1,Adicineia Aparecida
de Oliveira1 and Rogerio Patricio Chagas Nascimento1
1Universidade Federal de sergipe, Sergipe, Brasil
Keywords: Digital TV, Interactive Applications, Interactivity and Ontology.
Abstract: Convergence of technologies has enabled the formation of the Digital TV infrastructure. The Brazilian Digital
Television System (SBTVD) was developed with a layer of middleware called Ginga. This middleware sup-ports
the development of applications and is responsible for supporting interactivity. This structure provides
new opportunities and challenges. One of these challenges is the development process of interactive applica-tions
for Digital TV. Develop interactive applications for Digital TV is a new and complex process. Create
aid mechanisms to do this is necessary task. This paper proposes the development of an ontology that defines
the concepts and relationships in an interactive application. The ontology was developed from the execution
of a specific methodology and with the support of bibliographic references and systematic review. Multidis-ciplinary
teams that produce interactive applications can use the ontology as supporting documentation or to
understand the concepts of an application. Aiming to facilitate integration with other applications ontology
was available in OWL format. The ontology created is simple and can be revised and altered depending on the
context.
1 INTRODUCTION
Today there are several technologies that converge on
different devices, enabling new features and products.
Television also going through this series of modifi-cations
(Zuffo, 2006). The main change is the dig-ital
signal. The digital signal together with the re-turn
channel provides interactivity. The interactiv-ity
allows you to control the viewer about the han-dling
of applications and content creation (Montez
and Becker, 2005).
Development process of interactive application is
complex and immature for Digital Television. Com-plexity
exists because of the convergence of two dis-tinct
areas: audio-visual and software development
(Crocomo, 2007). Immaturity occurs due to lack of
methodologies, techniques and development methods
for this type of application. Teams multidisciplinary
provides a complex domain. The lack of knowledge
about this domain, affect the development of applica-tions.
To solve this problem we suggest the creation
of an ontology defining an interactive application of
Digital TV. An ontology brings the benefit of being in-dependent
technology and provide better understand-ing
of the problem from the modeling performed in a
higher level of abstraction (Gruber, 1993). This pa-per
proposes an ontology for defining an interactive
application of Digital TV. The ontology was created
from the use of a methodology and compiling con-cepts
raised through a literature search.
1.1 Related Work
Works found during the systematic review. A sys-tematic
review was performed from the string: ((on-tology)
OR (ontologia)) AND (((”Digital TV”) OR
(DTV) OR (”TV Digital”))). The research was con-ducted
in SPRINGER and periodicals CAPES. The
principle were found 237 papers. After application
of the inclusion criteria, 5 (five) were selected for
reading. The following are 3 of these articles. (Kim
and Kang, 2013) proposes an ontology of IPTV pro-grams
and viewers consumption behavior to improve
the ability to recommend ads. (Saleemi and Lilius,
2014) proposes a methodology with ontology-based
approach that helps to design and develop interactive
TV applications. In Tsinaraki et al. (Tsinaraki et al.,
2005) proposes a semantic indexing of audiovisual
content-based indexing ontologies for MPEG-7 and
TV-Anytime.

2. 1.2 Paper Structure
The introduction contextualizes the problem, explains
the difficulties, describes the motivations, presents the
objectives to develop the work. Theoretical back-ground
is the compilation of several concepts used in
the construction of ontology. In Topic 3 we have the
creation of ontology, from the execution of the steps
of the methodology. In the topic brief analysis of the
results is made evaluating the ontology based on qual-ity
criteria and levels of care to these criteria.
2 THEORETICAL BACKGROUND
This topic is done the compilation of concepts, Digital
TV, Interactivity and Ontology. The concepts are im-portant
because they provide the basis for the creation
of OntoAI.
2.1 Digital TV
Television is an electronic system for receiving sound
images and snapshots. It works based on the conver-sion
of light and sound into electromagnetic waves
and their conversion into a receiver (TV). Digital TV
offers new services that previously were not possi-ble
in the conventional transmission system into elec-tromagnetic
waves. Related to the digital television
services are broadcast to multiple types of handset,
record prgrams on your hard disk, computer systems,
games and internet access. Access internet is the main
way to promote the full interactivity in digital TV, this
access is via the return channel, can use it as a com-munication:
medium telephone line, dial-up, Asym-metric
Digital Subscriber Line (ADSL) Power Line
Communications (PLC), cable, satellite and mobile
phones (Meloni, 2007). Digital TV is a new plat-form
of communication, which over time will cause
changes society (Montez and Becker, 2005).
2.2 Interactivity
2.2.1 Concept
Interactivity is capacity (of equipment, communica-tion
system, or computer, etc.) to interact and interact
to allow.
In Interactive Digital TV, the TV is no longer uni-directional
and proceeds to allow greater user par-ticipation
in selecting contents (Montez and Becker,
2005). This change provides interactivity makes
the production process more complex content. For
(Steuer, 1992), the interactivity depends on the extent
how you can participate or influence the immediate
change in form and content.
2.2.2 Features
(Montez and Becker, 2005) describes five character-istics
of interactivity. They are: Ability to stop, Gran-ularity,
Soft Degradation, Limited Forecast and Non-
Default.
2.2.3 Levels of Interactivity
We categorizing interactivity from its scope in rela-tion
to the ability to control the contents in ascending
order (Montez and Becker, 2005). The categories are:
Reactive, Proactive and coercive.
2.2.4 Types of Interactivity
There are various types for interactivity. The most
used was proposed by the research and development
center in Telecommunications (CPqD) where there
are 3 types: Local, Intermittent, Permanent.
2.2.5 Types of Interactive Applications
(Montez and Becker, 2005) states that it is possible to
classify the whole range of information incorporated
by the term interactivity into seven major groups.
They are: TV Advanced (Enhanced TV), Internet on
TV, Individualized TV, Video On Demand, Personal
Video Recorder (PVR), Walled Garden and Games
Console. (Gawlinski, 2003) adds two new groups:
Electronic Program Guide and Teletext Services.
2.3 Ontology
2.3.1 Concept
(BlackBurn and Marcondes, 1997) describe ontology
as ”the branch of metaphysics that concerns what
exists.” Unlike philosophy, the term ontology has a
sui generis meaning in information organization and
computer science. To (Sowa, 2001), ontology is a
”catalog of types of things” where it is believed to be
a domain, from the perspective of someone who uses
a particular language. The ontology concept adopted
in Computer Science is expressed by (Gruber, 1993),
”an ontology is a specification of a conceptualization,
ie, an ontology is a description (like a formal specifi-cation
of a program) of the concepts and relationships
that can exist for an agent or a community of agents”.
(Borst, 2001) is a description of simpler and complete
ontology: ”An ontology is a formal, explicit specifi-cation
of a shared conceptualization”. Where formal

3. specification has the meaning understood by comput-ers;
explicit specification refers to the concepts, prop-erties,
relations, axioms; the shared word means con-sensual
knowledge (Almeida and Bax, 2003). In this
article we adopted the concept of (Borst, 2001) as a
basis to suggest OntoAI.
2.3.2 Features
Ontology may represent the same area in different
ways, this does not indicate that a diversity order is
correct and another wrong, only indicates that a do-main
can be represented in various ways depending
on the perspective that same rate. Despite this diver-sity,
ontologies have characteristics and basic compo-nents
common to most of them (Almeida and Bax,
2003). The basic components of an ontology are:
classes, relations, axioms, instances and functions
(Gruber, 1993).
2.3.3 Uses, Benefits and Problems
In computing, ontologies can be applied to: informa-tion
retrieval on the Internet, natural language pro-cessing,
knowledge management, semantic web, edu-cation
(Morais and Ambrosio, 2007). To (Guizzardi,
2000) the benefits of using ontologies are: commu-nication,
formal Specification (ontology) and knowl-edge
representation and reuse. Guizzardi addresses
the key issues such as choice of ontologies, creation
and evolution of ontologies, ontology library and de-velopment
methodologies, considered for the author
as the problem worse.
2.3.4 Types
(Almeida and Bax, 2003) says ontologies can be typ-ified
as to their degree of formality, application, con-tent
or function. The degrees of formality are highly
informal, semi-casual, semi-formal and formal rigor-ously.
Related to the application, can be neutral au-thorship,
specification and access to information. Re-garding
the content can be: terminology, informa-tion,
modeling knowledge, application, domain, or
generic or representation. With respect to their func-tion
(Structure) can be: generic, domain, task, appli-cation
or representation (Guarino, 1997).
2.3.5 Methodologies
Develop ontologies is still considered an artistic pro-cess,
so it is necessary the creation of methodolo-gies
that aims to standardize and organize the con-struction
and manipulation of ontologies (Lopez et al.,
1999). (Guizzardi, 2000) proposes a systematic ap-proach
based on 6 stages: identify the purpose and
specify requirements, capture the ontology and for-malize
the ontology, integrate with existing ontolo-gies
and evaluate / document. Figure 1 shows the ac-tivity
diagram and the iterative process of the method-ology,
with the sequence in which the steps must be
performed.
Figure 1: Methodology activity diagram adapted from
Morais e Ambrosio (2007). Source: Authors (2014).
2.3.6 Tools and Languages
The most popular tool for building ontologies is the
Prot´eg´e. Created by Stanford University is an open
source tool that provides a graphical interface for
building ontologies that supports several languages
(Noy and McGuinness, 2001).
The W3C (World Wide Web Consortium) recom-mends
the use of three languages: Ontolingua (Cre-ated
by the Knowledge Systems Laboratory at Stan-ford
University, is considered it the most expressive),
RDF (Developed by W3C) and OWL (Ontology Web
Language) also developed by W3C. It is a language
based on computational logic. It can be operated by
computer programs, for example, verify the consis-tency
of the knowledge (W3C, 2012).
3 BUILDING THE ONTOLOGY:
ONTOAI
The OntoAI was created from the Digital TV concepts
and interactivity and also from a lived experience in a

4. real development process. The OntoAI can be used as
a resource to assist the process of developing interac-tive
applications. first step in the creation of ontology
was sort your kind with regard to its function. The
ontology was classified as domain ontology because
it is a particular area of computing. For (Almeida and
Bax, 2003) the construction of domain ontologies in-volves
first defining its domain and its scope. The
field of ontology OntoAI are the interactive applica-tions
and the scope is the Digital TV. After defining
these elements, it was necessary to choose a construc-tion
methodology.
In this paper we adopted the methodology pro-posed
by (Guizzardi, 2000) to help systematize the
construction of OntoAI. The iteration allowed by the
methodology helped refine the ontology initially pro-posed.
This refinement was possible from revisions
made in OntoAI.
The following topics describe the activities of the
methodology. In each topic explains the activity and
how it should be performed. In each activity is shown
as we arrived to OntoAI.
3.1 Identify Purpose and Specify
Requirements
In this activity we identified the competence of the
ontology, ie, its purpose and use. The main purpose
is to assist the process of development of interactive
applications for Digital TV.
Other aims are: to serve as a base or generic
definition of an interactive application, to provide a
formal specification that can be understood by com-puter
and can be searched from appropriate query lan-guages,
sharing concepts involving such an applica-tion,
integrate and reduce the ”differences” between
the members of the multidisciplinary team provided
by the domain.
The ontology can be used as reference for the
analysis requirements as a starting device directed to
developing models, such as documentation to aid the
development process.
In this activity you can also identify potential
users of the ontology, as system developers, analysts
and software engineers, project managers, writers,
producers audio visual, audio visual support team.
The OntoAI ontology was created for a specific
audience, but its simplicity makes it easy to use the
same for anyone.
3.2 Capture Ontology
For (Almeida and Bax, 2003) is the most important
activity of the methodology, aims to capture the set
of elements of a domain, based on the expertise and
concepts that a involve.
The description of the basic components of an on-tology
defined by (Gruber, 1993) helped structure the
capture.
The classes (main element) were captured using
a top-down approach, which first defines the generic
concepts and then specialize them. Another technique
used was the taxonomy to organize in sub-classes fa-cilitating
the understanding.
The more general classes captured in the process
are listed below in order of importance:
Interactive-Application;
Interactivity;
Media;
Return-Channel;
Viewer;
Application-Type;
Interactivity-Type;
Interactivity-Level;
Interactivity-Features;
Interactivity-Location;
Interactivity-Time;
Interactivity-Access-Device.
Then there was the specialization of classes.
Some of these Return-Channel, Application-
Type, Interactivity-Type, Interactivity-Level and
Interactivity-Features were specialized based on
the concepts of interactivity seen in the theoretical
background.
The class Interactivity is specialized based on def-initions
provided in the Brazilian Digital TV stan-dard
(SBTVD), where interactivity is only possible
through the use of middlware swing and their special-izations
Ginga NCL and Ginga-J.
Other classes such as Media, Interactivity-Time,
Interactivity-Access-Device are specialized, from ex-perience
in developing this type of application. In
Figure 2 you can see the class structure and some spe-cializations.
This image shows the main structure of
the ontology OntoAI.
After defining the classes and their hierarchies,
you must define the relationships and constraints
(Cardinalities) between them. In OntoAI, the most
important relationship is contained in the Interactive-
Application class. This relationship defines the com-ponents
of an interactive application. In Figure 3, one
can see the relationships and cardinality of the class
Interactive-Application with the other classes: In-teractivity,
Media, Application-Type, Return-Channel
and Viewer.

5. Figure 2: Ontology class structure. Source: Authors (2014).
The class Interactive-Application has at least one
(1) type of application. It has a return channel. It
is composed of at least one (1) interactivity. It is
composed of at least one (1) media. The Viewer
class has a use relationship with the class Interactive-
Application.
Figure 3: Relationships and constraints (cardinality) of
class Interactive-Application. Source: Authors (2014).
Other important relationships are found in class
Interactivity. This relationship is who defines interac-tivity,
from their concepts. The class Interactivity has
somento one (1) type of interactivity. The Interactiv-ity
has one or more characteristics. Interactivity also
has access device, location, level and time. Here rela-tions
and cardinalities of intetatividade class in Figure
4.
Figure 4: Relationships and constraints (cardinality) of
class Interactivity. Source: Authors (2014).
Also in Figure 4 one can see the relationship be-tween
the Return-Channel and class Interactivity, this
relationship states that the interactivity is provided by
the use of the return channel in different levels. The
class Viewer has a relationship that shows that an in-dividual
(Instance) of this class interact with Interac-tivity.
Other less important relationships are defined
in the ontology.
3.3 Formalize Ontology
This activity proposes specify the ontology language.
For (Almeida and Bax, 2003) ontologies can be repre-sented
formally (Mathematical Models) or informally
(Natural Language). The language used to create the
OntoAI ontology is the OWL language is used be-cause
it has been easier to express meaning and se-mantics
than XML, RDF and RDF (S) and represent
interpretable content by machines. To consolidate the
formalization of ontology, we use the Prot´eg´e tool.
The tool was chosen because it supports the OWL and
contains mechanisms for verification of logical con-straints,
acquisition of information and etc. Figure 5
shows a snippet of the OWL ontology generated by
Prot´eg´e tool.
3.4 Integrate With Existing Ontologies
This activity is responsible for identifying possible
ontologies already defined. During the capture pro-cess
and formalization was not identified any on-tology
that could be integrated to OntoAI ontology.
Some classes could be references to other ontolo-gies,
but no existing ontology was compatible with
the needs of OntoAI ontology. It is worth noting that
the reuse of ontologies is recommended when possi-ble.

6. Figure 5: Part of OWL OntoAI code. Source: Authors
(2014).
3.5 Assess and Document
These two activities occur throughout the cycle of the
iterative method. The evaluation serves to verify that
the requirements (Purpose) are in accordance with the
final ontology. (Guizzardi, 2000) defines criteria for
assessing the quality of ontology. They are: Clar-ity,
Consistency, Extensibility and minimal ontolog-ical
commitment.
4 BRIEF ANALYSIS OF RESULTS
Figure 6 shows the evaluation of OntoAI ontology on
the criteria and service levels. The clarity criterion is
partially met because visually the class structure does
not show all the relationships and constraints of the
ontology. The consistency criterion is fully satisfied
because all classes were captured from concepts al-ready
established and referenced. The criterion on-tological
commitments minimum and also fully satis-fied
because the ontology although immature shown
in accordance with the basic requirements of an on-tology.
The extensibility criterion is partially met be-cause
not all classes were created thinking about this
feature, only some of them can be extended.
For (Guizzardi, 2000) documentation is made
throughout the development of the ontology. This
work was not possible to document the entire pro-cess,
the documented part refers to ontology created
in Prot´eg´e tool. The Prot´eg´e tool provides a feature
to export the ontology in OWL documentation, this
documentation is generated in HTML pages.
5 CONCLUSIONS
The choice of ontology can become a political pro-cess,
since an ontology may not be entirely appro-
Figure 6: Ontology was evaluated according to the criteria
of Guizzardi (2000). Source: Authors (2014).
priate for all individuals or related groups (Almeida
and Bax, 2003). OntoAI is based on Digital TV
concepts and interactivity, exposed in the theoretical
background over the concepts and experiences gained
in the development of a real application. Purpose of
the ontology is to help people involved in the process
of creating an interactive application of Digital TV, ie
the ontology was created on the point of view of the
developer and the audiovisual team, and not from the
point of view of the viewer.
Integration with existing ontologies facilitates
new ontology development process. Some studies
found during the protocol execution show the use of
ontologies as a basis for TV recommender systems or
defined ontology of TV programs.
The development process of interactive applica-tions
is still immature and complex. The creation of
tools, methods and techniques facilitates the develop-ment
process. This paper proposes an ontology that
defines what a interactive applications for Digital TV.
This ontology can be used to support the development
process.
The lack of ontologies that define an interactive
application was a stimulus to create the OntoAI. The
difficulties faced in the creation of ontology were for
lack of mature methodologies that show the process
of creating an ontology. The ontology first developed
Ad-hoc without the use of a methodology, the difficul-ties
in creating an ontology without a defined process
were increasing, making the process in artistic. Be-cause
of these difficulties a methodology was adopted
to carry out the task of creation. The ontology can
be further improved running other iterations of the
methodology. In future work it is possible to ver-ify
that the ontology can be used as the main artifact
of a software development project designed to mod-els.
The ontology is available inWebprotege from the
link: http://goo.gl/dJcLx

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