SILK: Logic Based Application Integration

IQSOFT Rt.

KFKI Számítástechnikai Rt.

SILK (System Integration via Logic and Knowledge, IST-1999-11135) is an EU IST Framework 5 project, with the goal of application integration, more specifically the integration of heterogeneous information systems.

Objectives

The objective of the SILK project is to develop a knowledge management tool-set for software systems integration tasks. The SILK tool-set will contain tools supporting both the linking of heterogeneous information sources (mediation) and their transformation into a more homogenous form (integration).

The project aims at proving the applicability of logic programming and intelligent agent technology as the implementation paradigms for the knowledge management tool-set. The project will also prove the practical relevance of the approach by developing several prototype applications, in both SME and large enterprise environments.

Further specific objectives include extensibility, use of emerging standards, support for technically untrained users, and integration with the business processes of the enterprise.

Development

The development of the SILK tool-set is driven by the requirements of the end-users on the application side, and by the state-of-the-art techniques from the field of knowledge management on the technology side.

Following the requirements analysis phase, the agent oriented architecture and interfaces of the SILK tool-set will be designed. Work will then proceed by developing the SILK meta- and query-languages, suitable for describing the databases and applications, both on abstract and technical levels.

The tool-set proper will then be developed in two stages. First the Mediator tools will be created, which support the coupling of heterogeneous information sources so that complex queries involving various databases/applications can be posed and answered. In the second stage the Integrator tools will be built, for analysing the information assets of the enterprise and helping the transformation of these to a more homogeneous form.

The implementation of the tools will be based on logic programming, agents and constraint techniques, ensuring high level knowledge representation, declarative interface descriptions and learning capabilities. This positions our solution above competing approaches by supporting semantic integration through generic modelling of the information assets.

Special emphasis will be put on extensibility of the tool-set, by supporting standard knowledge sharing formats, access to external knowledge, addition of new information sources and third party tools.