Ontology-driven Requirements Engineering: Building the OntoREM Meta Model

The present paper gives an insight into the process of developing the metamodel of OntoREM, an ontology-driven requirements engineering methodology, which is currently being developed at the University of the West of England in close cooperation with Airbus. The approach suggested by Noy and McGuinness (2000) has been followed to build a first version of the metamodel of OntoREM as an ontology specified in OWL using Protege-OWL. The outcomes and shortcomings of applying this approach in the context of OntoREM have been assessed showing a major shift in the way that requirements engineering is practiced from process-driven to also knowledge- driven requirements engineering. This, however, necessitates further empirical evaluation of the implementation of OntoREM.