[R] computational ontology to research questions, and statistical methods

[Ricardo Pietrobon]

our group at Duke is currently attempting to connect two data sets fed
through a web-based system, one containing research questions (i.e.,
variables positioned with certain roles) and a database of statistical
methods.  this connection is done informally in a number of R packages
and related software such as Rcmdr, R4calc, and Rkward where a
variable of a certain type is matched to a certain test.  For example,
a logistic regression model requires a dichotomous variable as its
dependent variable.  our goal is to formalize this link through a
computational ontology, which would standardize and hopefully
facilitate package and library development for R.

we have started some parallel efforts regarding both our requirements
for this ontology as well a search for existing ontologies.  So far we
couldn't find any existing ontology, which seems odd given the
widespread application such an ontology has

Question for the list members:  Is anybody aware of any existing
ontologies computational focusing on this topic?

thanks


Ricardo