Automatic ontology generation

A system for automatic ontology generation for consolidating and storing a set of data from a plurality of different data sources, comprising:

• a processor and a memory configured to provide components comprising computer program instructions to the processor to execute functions of the components, wherein the components comprising computer program instructions include:
• a seed component for providing a semantic network of concepts as an ontology template for a target domain of knowledge with the concepts defined as base entity types;
• a source reading component for selecting from the plurality of different data sources a subset of logical groupings of data based on a number of foreign key references to data within the plurality of different data sources and for reading the selected logical groupings of data and associated technical metadata from the plurality of different data sources;
• a data classification component for applying data discovery techniques to detect semantic and/or syntactic classification of data attributes in the selected logical groupings of data, wherein the data discovery techniques include:
• identifying formats of known concepts within the selected logical groupings of data to detect the semantic and/or syntactic classification of the data attributes indicating a corresponding concept;
• and
• validating the detected classification of the data attributes based on a quantity of values in the selected logical groupings of data satisfying constraints of the detected classification of the data attributes;
• an entity type component, for each of the selected logical groupings of data, generating an entity type with properties for the data attributes and adding the generated entity type to the semantic network with classifications of the properties as derived from the applied data discovery techniques;
• an entity associating component detecting semantic meanings of the generated entity types and associating the generated entity types to other entity types within the semantic network;
• and
• an ontology output component for outputting the semantic network as a resultant ontology for the set of data and for extracting the set of data from the plurality of different data sources and storing the extracted data in a centralized repository in accordance with the resultant ontology.

A computer program product for automatic ontology generation for consolidating and storing a set of data from a plurality of different data sources, the computer program product comprising a computer readable storage medium having program instructions embodied therewith, the program instructions executable by a processor to cause the processor to:

• provide a semantic network of concepts as an ontology template for a target domain of knowledge with the concepts defined as base entity types;
• select from the plurality of different data sources a subset of logical groupings of data based on a number of foreign key references to data within the plurality of different data sources;
• read the selected logical groupings of data and associated technical metadata from the plurality of different data sources;
• apply data discovery techniques to detect semantic and/or syntactic classification of data attributes in the selected logical groupings of data, wherein the data discovery techniques include:
• identifying formats of known concepts within the selected logical groupings of data to detect the semantic and/or syntactic classification of the data attributes indicating a corresponding concept;
• and
• validating the detected classification of the data attributes based on a quantity of values in the selected logical groupings of data satisfying constraints of the detected classification of the data attributes;
• for each of the selected logical groupings of data, generate an entity type with properties for the data attributes and add the generated entity type to the semantic network with classifications of the properties as derived from the applied data discovery techniques;
• detect semantic meanings of the generated entity types and associate the generated entity types to other entity types within the semantic network;
• output the semantic network as a resultant ontology for the set of data;
• and
• extract the set of data from the plurality of different data sources and store the extracted data in a centralized repository in accordance with the resultant ontology.