Explicit Conceptualizations for Knowledge Mapping

Knowledge mapping supports members of an organization in finding knowledge available within the organization, and in developing insights into corporate expertise. An essential prerequisite is an explicit conceptualization of the subject domain to enable the classification of knowledge resources. Many tools exist to create explicit conceptualizations. This paper establishes a set of requirements for conceptualization tools from the perspective of knowledge mapping. Next, a number of tools are reviewed – thesauri, ontologies, and semantic networks – using the following criteria: the complexity, the effort required, and the degree to which it is possible to integrate it into the overall knowledge mapping system.