1 Semantic Interoperability Community of Practice (SICoP) Presentation for the KM.Gov Working Group Meeting, January 20, 2006, and the 4 th Semantic Interoperability for E-Government Conference, February 9-10, 2006 Brand L. Niemann, Computer Scientist U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, D.C U.S.A. Chair, Federal CIO Council's Semantic Interoperability Community of Practice (SICoP) and

2

3 Highlights The Semantic Interoperability Community of Practice (SICoP) has made considerable progress towards implementations of semantic technologies and web standards in the U.S. government with a series of white papers, conferences, and pilot projects.

4 Highlights Introducing Semantic Technologies and the Vision of the Semantic Web: –White Paper Delivered to the CIO Council's Architecture & Infrastructure and Best Practices Committees, February 16, 2005, and Translated into Japanese. The Business Case for Semantic Technologies: –Presentation for public discussion on September 14, 2005, and White Paper Soon for Review. Implementing the Semantic Web: –Roadmap, Resources, and Featured Best Practice Implementation Example for public discussions on September 14, 2005, and Implementation Guide for Data Reference Model for public use on October 17, Planned for completion in early 2007.

5 Highlights Fourth Semantic Interoperability for E-Government Conference, February 9-10, 2006, MITRE, McLean, Virginia: –February 9th: Opening Keynote and Demonstration: –The Semantic Web for Bioinformatics – Professor Ken Baclawski –Ontology-based Searching for Health Information (e.g. Is my child safe from environmental toxins?) – Michael Belanger Featured Presentation and Panel: –The Business Case for Semantic Technologies – Mills Davis –Senior Officials and Managers - OMB, CIO Council, Agency, IAC, etc. Work Group and Partner Reports (5) Closing Keynote and Challenge – Professor Jim Hendler –February 10th: Work Group Sessions: –Data Reference Model Implementation, Health Information Technology Ontology, FEA Reference Model Ontology, and Ontology and Taxonomy Coordination. Tutorials (Oracle, TopQuadrant, etc.)

6 Highlights January 24 th : Collaborative Expedition Workshop, Bootstrapping Service-Oriented Architecture and Semantic Interoperability Across the Model-Driven Architecture and Knowledge Representation Communities of Practice. February th : Lockheed Martin Information Technology Trends Conference, SICoP Keynote and Business Case for Semantic Technologies Presentations. November 5-9 th : 5th International Semantic Web Conference, Athens, Georgia. SICoP Participation Invited.

7 Highlights December 5-7, 2005, Knowledge Management Collaboration & Knowledge Sharing Conference, Orlando, Florida: –Using CoPs To Simplify Processes and Unify Work Across Agencies: Cross-Industry Applications: Semantically Enabled Content (Wiki Purple Numbers, Ontology Modeling Before Content is Created-e.g., SiberLogic, Repurposed Content, etc.) December 13, 2005, Invited Presentation to the Federal Metadata Management Consortium (FMMC): –SICoP and DRM Implementation Through Iteration and Testing Work: Making It Real: Semantic Knowledge Modeling and a Knowledge Reference Model for Implementing the Semantic Web in the Federal Government.

8 Highlights “You should be proud of the way that DRM 2.0 turned out and how it has been accepted by the data community. The open, collaborative development process sets it apart, and gives us a high standard for our other efforts across government.” –Richard Burk, Chief Architect, OMB, 12/22/2005. Note: The SICoP White Paper 1, Figure 6 (Data Structure Continuum, From Pollock and Hodgson, 2004) suggested the three basic types of data used in the DRM 2.0 – see next slide!

9 Highlights Source: Expanding E-Government, Improved Service Delivery for the American People Using Information Technology, December 2005, pages

10 The Federal CIO Council's Semantic Interoperability Community of Practice (SICoP) Presentation at the XML 2005 Conference, November 15, Atlanta, GA Dr. Brand L. Niemann, Computer Scientist U.S. Environmental Protection Agency, Washington, D.C U.S.A. Chair, Federal CIO Council's Semantic Interoperability Community of Practice (SICoP) and Biography:

11 Overview Abstract 1. Background 2. Conferences and Public Meetings 3. White Papers 4. Working Groups and Pilot Projects 5. Deploying RDF and OWL 6. Conclusions and Next Steps Acknowledgements

12 Abstract Towards Executable Enterprise Models in Composite Applications for E-Government: –The Semantic Interoperability Community of Practice (SICoP) has made considerable progress towards implementations of semantic technologies and web standards in the U.S. government with a series of white papers, conferences, and pilot projects. Key Words: DAML, E-Government, Interoperability, RDF, Ontology, Semantic Web

13 1. Background Charter Excerpts: –The Semantic Interoperability Community of Practice (SICoP) is established by a group of individuals for the purpose of achieving "semantic interoperability" and "semantic data integration" in the government sector. –The SICoP seeks to enable Semantic Interoperability, specifically the "operationalizing" of these technologies and approaches, through online conversation, meetings, tutorials, conferences, pilot projects, and other activities aimed at developing and disseminating best practices. –The individuals making up this CoP represent a broad range of government organizations and the industry and academic partners that support them. However, the SICoP claims neither formal nor implied endorsements by the organizations represented.

14 1. Background XML 2004 Presentation: The Federal CIO Council's Semantic Interoperability Community of Practice (SICoP) –See s/paper224.html XML 2004 Town Hall: Networking of U.S. Federal Government Communities of Practice Using XML –See s/paper319.html

15 1. Background The E-Gov Act of The Federal Enterprise Architecture’s Data Reference Model (DRM). Selected Lines of Business (e.g., Data & Statistics and Federal Health Architecture). Individual E-Gov Initiatives and Agency Missions. White Paper Modules 2 and 3. Coordination and participation in the W3Cs Semantic Web Best Practices and Deployment Working Group. Plan for the Third Semantic Technologies for eGovernment Conference! Merged with DRM below. Yes! US EPA! Yes! Somewhat. Yes – SICoP Public Meeting, September 14, 2005, and Announced for March 23-24, Future Activities: Promised in 2004Future Activities: Delivered in 2005

16 1. Background Overview of the Paper: –2. Conferences and Public Meetings –3. White Papers –4. Working Groups and Pilot Projects –5. Deploying RDF and OWL: Tuesday, November 15 th, 11:00 a.m., The PCs PI Guide to Deploying XML. –6. Conclusions and Next Steps –Acknowledgements

17 2. Conferences and Public Meetings First Annual Semantic Technologies for e-Government Conference, September 8, 2003: –Eric Miller and Jim Hendler keynoted, Semantic Web book distributed, over 100 attended, and 10 vendors exhibited: See See j.htm&f=templates&2.0 Second Annual Semantic Technologies for e- Government Conference, September 8-9, 2004: –Eric Miller and Jim Hendler keynoted, over 250 attended, and 30 vendors/posters exhibited: See eedings.htm

18 2. Conferences and Public Meetings Semantic Web Applications for National Security (SWANS) Conference, April 7-8, 2005: –Joint DARPA/DAML and SICoP effort, Sir Tim Berners-Lee keynoted, over 320 attended, and 40 vendors/posters exhibited: See See services.gov/lpBin22/lpext.dll/Folder5/Infobase4/1?fn=main- j.htm&f=templates&2.0 Semantic Interoperability Community of Practice (SICoP) Public Meeting, September 14, 2005: –White Papers 2 and 3 presented and four Special Recognitions for Best Practices (see next four slides): See bin/wiki.pl?SICoPConference_2005_09_14

19 For “Outstanding Contributions” as SICoP Team Lead for the Module 2 White Paper "The Business Case for Semantic Technologies". A noted researcher and industry analyst who has authored over 100 reports, whitepapers, articles, and industry studies and who was willing to share so much time, talent, and energy in the development of the SICoP Business Cases and Implementation Pilots. Special Recognition Mills Davis, Managing Director, TopQuadrant, Inc. Federal CIO Council’s Semantic Interoperability Community of Practice (SICoP) Presented at the 2005 SICoP Annual Meeting, September 14, 2005, at the MITRE Corporation, McLean, VA, by SICoP Chair, Brand Niemann, U.S. EPA.

20 For “Breakthrough Performance” in the Application of Ontological Engineering to Model-Driven Architecture that Represents a “Best Practice Business Case” for Semantic Interoperability in Support of National Security and Disaster Recovery as Recently Presented to the CIO Council's Architecture & Infrastructure Committee and Its Chief Architect Forum and the Industry Advisory Council. Special Recognition Roy Roebuck, Chief Architect, Continuity Communications Enterprise Architecture Program Office, Federal Executive Branch Federal CIO Council’s Semantic Interoperability Community of Practice (SICoP) Presented at the 2005 SICoP Annual Meeting, September 14, 2005, at the MITRE Corporation, McLean, VA, by SICoP Chair, Brand Niemann, U.S. EPA.

21 For “Outstanding Contributions” in Providing a Visionary Composite Application Platform That Emerged From the SWANS 2005 Conference as SICoP’s “Featured Best Practice Implementation Example” and Has Demonstrated “Executable Integration of the FEA Reference Models in Composite Applications” in Coordination with “The Business Case for Semantics Technologies” by Mills Davis of TopQuadrant. Special Recognition Rohit Agarwal, Founder, President and CEO, Digital Harbor Federal CIO Council’s Semantic Interoperability Community of Practice (SICoP) Presented at the 2005 SICoP Annual Meeting, September 14, 2005, at the MITRE Corporation, McLean, VA, by SICoP Chair, Brand Niemann, U.S. EPA.

22 For “Outstanding Contributions” to Providing Critical Infrastructure for Collaborative Ontology Development: The Ontolog Forum, The Collaboration Wiki, Protégé, and The Server for Multi-User Protégé That Support SICoP and Other Federal Communities of Practice, the New National Center for Ontological Research, and a World- Wide Community. Special Recognition Peter Yim, President & CEO of CIM Engineering, Inc., and Mark Musen, Stanford Medical Informatics, Stanford University Federal CIO Council’s Semantic Interoperability Community of Practice (SICoP) Presented at the 2005 SICoP Annual Meeting, September 14, 2005, at the MITRE Corporation, McLean, VA, by SICoP Chair, Brand Niemann, U.S. EPA.

23 2. Conferences and Public Meetings Dynamic Knowledge Repository - Community Wiki: See slide 24. Dynamic Knowledge Repository - Best Practices: See slide 25. See Facilitating the Evolution of Our Collective IQ by Doug Engelbart, September 1, 2005: –See Note: We are trying to integrate Engelbart’s Open Hyperdocument System and the W3C’s Semantic Web paradigms.

24 2. Conferences and Public Meetings See Purple number and RSS enabled!

25 2. Conferences and Public Meetings See Dynamic Knowledge Repositories

26 3. White Papers 1. Introducing Semantic Technologies and the Vision of the Semantic Web: –Delivered to the CIO Council's Architecture & Infrastructure and Best Practices Committees, February 16, 2005, and Being Translated into Japanese: See 1.v5.4.kf doc Also see slide The Business Case for Semantic Technologies: –For public discussion on September 14, 2005: See 3. Implementing the Semantic Web: –Roadmap, Resources, and Featured Best Practice Implementation Example for public discussions on September 14, 2005: See

27 3. White Papers

28 3. White Papers 2. The Business Case for Semantic Technologies: –Topics: Quick facts: –Semantic technologies –Technology providers –Early adoption –Business value –Opportunity Semantic execution value paradigms: –Operational enterprise architecture –Composite applications –Smart content –Knowledge computing

29 3. White Papers 2. The Business Case for Semantic Technologies: –1. SEMANTIC TECHNOLOGIES ARE ABOUT PUTTING ONTOLOGIES TO WORK...: SEMANTIC MODELS (AKA ONTOLOGIES) ARE LIKE AND UNLIKE OTHER IT MODELS: –Like XML schemas they are native to the web (and are in fact serialized in XML). Unlike XML schemas, ontologies are graphs not trees, and used for reasoning. –2. NEARLY 200 SEMANTIC TECHNOLOGY R& D, PRODUCT & SOLUTION PROVIDERS. –3. MORE THAN 100 SEMANTIC TECHNOLOGY EARLY ADOPTER BUSINESS CASES. –4. BUSINESS PERFORMANCE IMPROVES 2-10X. –5. SEMANTIC EXECUTION WORLD-WIDE MARKET WILL EXCEED TO $50 BILLION BY 2010 (see next slide).

30 3. White Papers SEMANTIC EXECUTION WORLD-WIDE MARKET WILL EXCEED TO $50 BILLION BY 2010

31 3. White Papers

32 3. White Papers

33 3. White Papers

34 3. White Papers Composite Applications - Implications for the Federal Enterprise Architecture Data Reference Model: –Tools that enable exchange, compositing and harmonization of distributed data and metadata sources in the context of the intended end-use application. –Sharing semantic models for composite applications that include entities, attributes, relationships, processes, events, and rules as well as security and provenance.

35 3. White Papers 2. The Business Case for Semantic Technologies: –Summary: Semantic technologies are about putting ontologies (semantic models) to work. Nearly 200 firms have semantic products and solution development underway. Nearly 100 have products. SICoP research has reviewed more than 100 government and industry business cases. Early adopter research documents 2 to 10 times improvements in key measures of performance across the solution lifecycle. Semantic solution, services & software markets will top $50B by Four semantic execution value paradigms will drive adoption: –operational enterprise architecture, composite applications, smart content, & knowledge computing.

36 3. White Papers 3. Implementing the Semantic Web: –Roadmap (see next slide): See bin/wiki.pl?ExpeditionWorkshop/DesigningTheDRM_DataAcc essibility_2005_08_16#nid2UHU –Resources: See bin/wiki.pl?SICoPConference_2005_09_14#nid2YFB –Featured Best Practice Implementation Example: Modeling Data and Processes for 360 Degree Views, Rohit Agarwal, Digital Harbor –See 14/DHGovernment.ppt

37 3. White Papers Roadmap: –1. Learn About the W3C’s Standard for Data Modeling and Information Sharing (RDF): The Semantic Interoperability Information Sharing Tool Kit Pilot Part 2 - Modeling and Merging of Vocabularies. –2. Learn to Use Tools to View, Create, and Validate RDF. –3. Learn About a Major New Semantic Web Application Called DOAP: Description of a Project from a Tutorial. –4. Learn About the Semantic Technology Profiles for the Federal Enterprise Architecture Data Reference Model (DRM).

38 3. White Papers Featured Best Practice Implementation Example: –Modeling Data and Processes for 360 Degree Views, Rohit Agarwal, Digital Harbor (recall slides 30-32): Executable Integration of the FEA Reference Models in Composite Applications Fact Sheet: – Demos: –Intelligence Community: » –Voting/Census Data: » –Water Resources: »In process. –FEA Management: »In process.

39 4. Working Groups and Pilot Projects 1. Common Upper Ontology WG ("CUO-WG"): –Lead - Jim Schoening, U.S. Army. Now part of FEA Reference Model Ontology (Section 5): –Submit Comments: bin/wiki.pl?HowToSubmitFEARMO_Comments 3. Ontology Taxonomy Coordination WG ("ONTAC"): Lead - Pat Cassidy, MITRE. 4. DRM Implementation Through Iteration and Testing Pilot Projects: –Lead – Brand Niemann, SICoP Chair.

40 4. Working Groups and Pilot Projects Pilot Projects Brief History: – vendors – vendors –SWANS vendors –Today’s Module 2 database - over 150 vendors! –28 presented at Workshops/Forums in the last 3 months! See bin/wiki.pl?DataReferenceModelPublicForum_2005_06_13 bin/wiki.pl?ExpeditionWorkshop#nid2RG3

41 5. Deploying RDF and OWL Tuesday, November 15 th, 11 a.m., The PCs PI Guide to Deploying XML. –Sources: Shelley Powers, Practical RDF, Solving Problems with the Resource Description Framework, O’Reilly, Thomas Passin, Explorer’s Guide to the Semantic Web, Manning Publications, Lee Lacy, OWL – Representing Information Using the Web Ontology Language, Trafford, Ken Baclawski and Tianhua Niu, Ontologies for Bioinformatics, MIT Press, Tim Berners-Lee, SWANS Conference, April 7, 2005 and Interview, June 2005 (see slide 39). –Friday, November 18 th, 9 a.m. – 5:30 p.m., Shelley Powers, Tutorial: Pushing Triples: An Introduction to Street RDF (cancelled due to family illness).

42 5. Deploying RDF and OWL Ever since I started working with XML in its earliest days, I’ve longed for a metamodel to define vocabularies in XML that could be merged with other vocabularies, all of which could be manipulated by the same APIs. I found this with RDF and RDF/XML (Shelley Powers). If RDF is analogous to the relational data model, and RDF/XML is analogous to relational database systems, then OWL is equivalent to applications such as SAP and PeopleSoft which implement a business domain model on top of the relational store (Shelley Powers). RDF is much better at abstracting semantics from syntax than ordinary XML (Tim Berners-Lee).

43 5. Deploying RDF and OWL Differences: –RDF/XML uses namespace and URIs (URLs in this case). –RDF/XML is more difficult to read and to see the relationships between the data – a common complaint about RDF/XML. –RDF/XML adds a layer of complexity on the XML that can be off-putting when working with it manually. –Within an automated process, though, the RDF/XML structure is actually an advantage: There is a fairly significant strain on memory use, particularly with processing larger XML documents. Optimized query capability and joining vocabularies are excellent reasons for using RDF as a model for data and RDF/XML as a format. When to Use and Not Use RDF: –RDF/XML meets a business rather than a technical need to use the model and related XML structure. –RDF/XML is not a replacement for XHTML, CSS, SOAP, & XML-RPC.

44 5. Deploying RDF and OWL Model for RDF: –A collection of statements (or triples), each with a subject, predicate, and an object (English grammar). RDF Formats: –XML –Graphs –Non-XML (Notation 3-N3 and N-triples): (see next slide) Tim Berners-Lee and Dan Connolly, unofficial, but published in document by the W3C. N3 processors like, cwm, can perform logical inferences on the triples and N3 can be converted into RDF/XML and vice versa. See “Explorer’s Guide to the Semantic Web,” Thomas Passin, Manning Publications, 2004, Chapter 2. Describing data with RDF, page 56.

45 5. Deploying RDF and OWL RDF Inferencing in Oracle’s Spatial Network Data Model Source: 39. Grandfathers – With Inferencing in

46 5. Deploying RDF and OWL Semantic Web’s Layered Architecture Definitions: –RDF and RDF/XML: RDF is the model and RDF/XML is the XML syntax for storing the model. RDF is used to specify OWL instances. It is the most important value-added layer of the Semantic Web’s architecture. –RDF Schema (RDFS): RDF’s vocabulary description language, is the a semantic extension of RDF. It provides the mechanisms for describing groups of related resources and the relationships between these resources. –OWL permits the definition of sophisticated ontologies, a fundamental requirement in the integration of heterogeneous information content. OWL ontologies will also be important for the characterization of interoperable services for knowledge- intensive processing on the Web (e.g., Grid and Pervasive Computing). Source: Lee Lacy, OWL – Representing Information Using the Web Ontology Language, Trafford, 2005, pages 83, 111, and 133.

47 5. Deploying RDF and OWL Tim Berners-Lee (June 2005 Interview by Andrew Updegrove at –One of the criticisms I hear most often is, “The Semantic Web doesn’t do anything for me I can’t do with XML”. This is a typical response of someone who is very used to programming things in XML, and never has tried to integrate things across large expanses of an organization, at short notice, with no further programming. One IT professional who made that comment around four years ago, said a year ago words to the effect, “After spending three years organizing my XML until I had a heap of home-made programs to keep track of the relationships between different schemas, I suddenly realized why RDF had been designed. Now I use RDF and its all so simple – but if I hadn’t have had three years of XML hell, I wouldn’t ever have understood.” –Many of the criticisms of the Semantic Web seems (to me at least) the result of not having understood the philosophy of how it works. A critical part, perhaps not obvious from the specs, is the way different communities of practice develop independently, bottom up, and then can connect link by link, like patches sewn together at the edges. So some criticize the Semantic Web for being an (clearly impossible) attempt to make a complete top down ontology of everything.

48 5. Deploying RDF and OWL Work locallyWork in wider group Fast: Just do itSlow: Committees! Concepts match local needsHave to adapt to other group's concepts Less usable laterLater, serendipitous reuse Start locallyLater negotiate Sir Tim Berners-Lee at the SWANS Conference, April 7 on “the constant tension” Keep a wise balance. The semantic web allows a mixture of the two approaches, and smooth transitions between them.

49 5. Deploying RDF and OWL TypePurposeExampleURL Unstruc- tured Categorization & Search Enhancement 3.1 DCDOT uk/metadata/dcdot/ DF/Validator/ Semi- structured Sharing3.2 FOAF m/foaf/foaf-a- matic.html net/ StructuredIntegration 3.3 ConvertToRDF p.org/~mhgrove/Con vertToRDF/ Oracle 10gR2

50 5. Deploying RDF and OWL Encoding an OWL Ontology: –Phases: Object-oriented requirements analysis: –Develop common expectations for the domain description. Knowledge acquisition: –Use authoritative sources for the domain. Knowledge engineering: –Describe a structured interpretation of the domain that references the authoritative sources. Design: –Use graphical design languages like UML to visualize the relationships. Source: Lee Lacy, OWL – Representing Information Using the Web Ontology Language, Trafford, 2005, page 143.

51 5. Deploying RDF and OWL OWL Ontology File Structure: –OWL Header (usually reused): XML Declaration and RDF Start Tag Namespaces Versioning Information and Import Statements Ontology Element (owl:Ontology) –Body: Statements about classes, properties, and their relationships. –Makes the open-world assumption – just because something is not specified, you cannot assume it to be false; it might be specified somewhere on the web. –Footer – Closing Tag. Example: An organization standardizes their ontologies that extend another organization’s ontologies (see schematic diagram). Source: Lee Lacy, OWL – Representing Information Using the Web Ontology Language, Trafford, 2005, Chapter 11.

52 5. Deploying RDF and OWL Web Ontology Language Architecture. Source: Lee Lacy, OWL – Representing Information Using the Web Ontology Language, Trafford, 2005, page 144. Standard namespaces: XMLS Datatype OWL Specification RDFS Specification RDF Specification Ontologies on Web Servers Ontology Steward’s Web Server Information Publisher’s Web Server RDF Instance Data OWL Imports Ontology Ontology- specific Datatypes OWL Imports compliant with Ontologies being Used/Extended namespace references

53 5. Deploying RDF and OWL Federal Enterprise Reference Model Ontology (FEA RMO): –This is a composite application with multiple ontologies created from manually extracting the concepts from the FEA PRM, BRM, SRM, and TRM documents into Protégé. –This has been recommended to OMB/AIC as the way to maintain and update the Reference Models in the future to insure semantic consistency across all the Reference Models (and Profiles). Online Version: –Home Pages: –Documentation: Best Practices Repository at Submit FEARMO comments: – Modeling the FEA Reference Model Documents

54 5. Deploying RDF and OWL FEA-RMO at SWANS in SWOOP from MindSwap Research Group (Jim Hendler). Concise Format Abstract Syntax RDF/XML Turtle Ontology List Ontology Hierarchy Reasoner: Pellet RDFS-like Note: The Semantic Web makes the hyperlinks into ontological relationships and the same language is used for both ontologies and data!

55

56 5. Deploying RDF and OWL Pilot Progress to be reported by Mills Davis at the Joint CoP Meeting at the Enterprise Architecture Conference, September 21, 2005, noon-2 p.m., Ronald Reagan Building and International Trade Center, Hemisphere A, Washington, DC.

57 6. Conclusions and Next Steps SICoP Goals: –Conduct Regular Collaboration Workshops and Conference Calls. –Make Public Data Available in Standard Semantic Web Formats* and Build Ontologies. –Complete White Paper 3. Implementing the Semantic Web. –Complete the Federal Enterprise Architecture Data Reference Model Implementation Through Iteration and Testing Work. *Sir Tim-Berners Lee at the SWANS Conference, April 7, 2005.

58 6. Conclusions and Next Steps SICoP Upcoming Events: –National Center for Ontological Research (NCOR), Inaugural Event, October 27-28, 2005: Towards e-Government: The Federal Enterprise Architecture Reference Ontology (with Peter Yim, Co-Convenor, Ontolog Forum). –SICoP Public Meeting/Fourth Semantic Technologies for E-Government Conference, March 23-24, 2006, MITRE: Day 1 for Vendor/Poster Displays and Tutorials. Day 2 for Presentations/Demonstrations/Discussions (like the SWANS 2005 Conference).

59 Acknowledgements The author expresses deep appreciation to his former SICoP Co-Chair, Rick Morris (retired), and all the SICoP members for the opportunity to participate together in the building one of the first communities of practice in the federal government that is a public-private partnership. The author also expresses deep appreciation to Susan Turnbull, Mills Davis, Peter Yim, and Mark Greaves for their many rich conversations, meetings, and contributions that have made SICoP a success.