Achieving Semantic Interoperability By Using Complex Event Processing Technology

State-of-the-art interoperability between heterogeneous systems on a technical level builds on services oriented architectures (SOA) for a given problem space. Semantics can be introduced by the use of descriptive languages and reasoning algorithms, usually implemented within a message-based enterprise service bus (ESB), the messages triggering service invocation and consumption. Complex event processing (CEP) allows for the definition and detection of situations based on the correlated occurrence of a set of messages, rather than single ones. This paper introduces the technology and lists first references. 1 Problem Statement Increasing collaboration beyond organizational boundaries and during long-lasting and complex processes is a global trend. Interoperability is usually defined as “the ability of two or more systems or components to exchange information and [meanfully] use the exchanged information”. Up to now interoperability has mainly been dealt with in the information systems and communication technology (ICT) layer. In order to achieve seamless business interaction between organizations interoperability has to include semantic descriptions for the business and knowledge layers. Necessary for the achievement of such enterprise interoperability is the application and combination of latest research results in the three key areas of the interoperability problem space: enterprise modeling, ontology-based systems plus ontology modeling and mo-dern ICT solutions: Model-Driven Architecture (MDA), semantic web and Agent-Based Systems (MDA). Picture 1: Layers of Interoperability 1 F.e. EICTA Interoperability White Paper [EIC04] 2 as targeted f.e. within the European Commission sponsored project ATHENA [IS07] Business