Abstract — The eXtended Markup Language (XML) has emerged in the Internet world as a standard representation format, which can be useful to describe and transmit management information. However, XML formats alone do not give formal semantics to it. To solve this question, ontology languages based on the Resource Description Framework can be used to improve the expressiveness of the management information specifications. This paper presents an approach that uses an XML-based ontology language to define network and system management information. For this, the structures of the Web Ontology Language known as OWL are analyzed and compared to those used in management definitions, studying also the advantages that ontology languages can provide in this area.

Abstract. Self-managing systems will be highly dependent upon information acquired from disparate applications, devices, components and subsystems. To be effectively managed, such information will need to conform to a common model. One standard that provides a common model for describing disparate computer and network information is the Common Information Model (CIM). Although CIM defines the models necessary for inferring properties about distributed systems, its specification as a semi-formal ontology limits its ability to support important requirements of a self-managing distributed system including knowledge interoperability and aggregation, as well as reasoning. To support these requirements, there is a need to model, represent and share CIM as a formal ontology. In this paper, we propose a framework for constructing a CIM ontology based upon previous research that identified mappings from Unified Modeling Language (UML) constructs to ontology language constructs. We extend and apply these mappings to a UML representation of the CIM Schema in order to derive a semantically valid and consistent formal CIM ontology. 1

In this paper, we propose a new approach to performance analysis, data sharing and tools integration in Grids that is based on ontology. We devise a novel ontology for describing the semantics of monitoring and performance data that can be used by performance monitoring and measurement tools. We introduce an architecture for an ontology-based model for performance analysis, data sharing and tools integration. At the core of this architecture is a Grid service which offers facilities for other services to archive and access ontology models along with collected performance data, and to conduct searches and perform reasoning on that data. Using an approach based on ontology, performance data will be easily shared and processed by automated tools, services and human users, thus helping to leverage the data sharing and tools integration, and increasing the degree of automation of performance analysis.

Abstract. Current network management architectures are using different models to define management information objects. These definitions actually also include, in a non-formal way, the definition of some behaviour information that a manager should accomplish related to the managed objects. So, a manager is not able to make an automatic processing of this behaviour information. Prior research work proposed the use of formal ontology languages, such as OWL, as a way to make a semantic integration of different management information definitions. This paper goes further proposing a formal definition of the different management behaviour specifications integrated with the management information definitions. Thus, usual behaviour definitions included implicitly in the management information definitions and explicitly in policy definitions can be expressed formally, and included with the information definitions. This paper focuses on the definition of behaviour rules in management information with SWRL, a rule language defined to complement OWL functionality. 1

Abstract. Web service technology has been proposed to implement management interfaces of managed resources. These web services can usually be combined to perform composite processes. These composite processes can be defined with service ontologies such as OWL-S, which allows their formal description. However, other technologies, including the Web Services Business Process Execution Language (WSBPEL), provide more mature execution engines. This paper presents an approach to define and execute composite network management processes with existing technology. For this, a use case is developed in which a set of web service interfaces are defined for a network probe, and a composite process is specified using OWL-S to monitor the network load. Then, this specification is later translated to WSBPEL and interpreted by a real execution engine.

In this paper we present an approach based on the use of embedded network devices for the deployment of small network services, such as DHCP, BOOTP, filters or very specific proxies. The novelty of the proposal resides in the very reduced size of the devices, in that every device is specialized in a certain network function, and specially designed to operate with minimum maintenance, and in the fact that they are presented under both conventional (client-server) and more open (SOA) standards, more concretely, as Web Services. At the same time, these embedded services can work in an individual way or in collaboration with other enterprise network services, either provided by means of conventional systems or by means of other embedded devices. To specify the proposal, we have chosen as example an embedded device able to manage the remote boot of network nodes by means of Wake on LAN (WoL) through Internet. 1.

In this paper, we propose a new approach to performance analysis, data sharing and tools integration in Grids that is based on ontology. We devise a novel ontology for describing the semantics of monitoring and performance data that can be used by performance monitoring and measurement tools. We introduce an architecture for an ontology-based model for performance analysis, data sharing and tools integration. At the core of this architecture is a Grid service which oers facilities for other services to archive and access ontology models along with collected performance data, and to conduct searches and perform reasoning on that data. We also discuss how ontology can be used in automatic performance analysis. Using an approach based on ontology, performance data will be easily shared and processed by automated tools, services and human users, thus helping to leverage the data sharing and tools integration, and increasing the degree of automation of perfor- A short version of this report is published in Proceedings of International Conference on Computational Science 2004 (ICCS 2004), Krakow, Poland, June 7-9, 2004.

Abstract. The goal of ontology-based management is to improve the manageability of network resources through the application of formal ontologies. Prior research work has studied their application to represent the management information definitions, the mapping and merging processes to obtain a semantic integration of those definitions, and the representation of behaviour and policy definitions. Using ontologies allows the additional advantage of integrating, in the same semantic manager, business and service level ontologies with the network management ontology, in a framework for automated management. This integration allows for policy refinement and interoperation between high level policies and low level policies. 1

The multiplicity of Network Management models (SNMP, CMIP, DMI, WBEM...) has raised the need of defining multiple mechanisms to allow the interoperability among all involved management domains. One basic component of such interoperability is the mapping between the information models that each domain specifies. These mappings, usually carried out with syntactical translations, can reach the semantic level by using ontologies. This article shows the advantages of using formal ontology techniques to improve the integration of current network management models. Applying this representation method, network managers can work and reason with an abstract view of the management information, independent of the specific management model used to interoperate with the managed resources, which can also include basic behaviour constraints.

Network management is an area where many different technologies coexist Several languages are used to define the information to be managed, which are specific of each management model As a r esult, many specifications that describe similar resources are expressed separately To solve this question, this paper takes advantage of the knowledge representation technique known as ontology to unify current heterogeneous information definitions from a semantic viewpoint With this approach, management information is specified using ontology languages, including behavior constraints, and methods used to combine ontologies are applied to merge and map the concepts contained in existing management models Keywords: Ontology, Management Specification, Information Integration, Be- havior Description 1