Blockchain Design and Modelling

Blockchain Design and Modelling
Nicolae Sfetcu
February 17, 2019
Sfetcu, Nicolae, " Blockchain Design and Modelling", SetThings (February 17, 2019),
MultiMedia Publishing (ed.), URL = https://www.telework.ro/en/blockchain-design-and-
modelling/
Email: nicolae@sfetcu.com
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NoDerivatives 4.0
International. To view a copy of this license, visit
http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nd/4.0/.
This is a partial translation of
Sfetcu, Nicolae, " Filosofie tehnologiei blockchain - Ontologii", SetThings (1 februarie 2019),
MultiMedia Publishing (ed.), DOI: 10.13140/RG.2.2.25492.35204, ISBN 978-606-033-154-4,
URL = https://www.telework.ro/ro/e-books/filosofia-tehnologiei-blockchain-ontologii/
Blockchain Design and Models
Blockchain design
Ontology engineering, (Smith 2004) along with semantic Web technologies, allow the
semantic development and modeling of the operational flow required for blockchain design. The
semantic Web, in accordance with W3C, "provides a common framework that allows data to be
shared and reused across application, enterprise, and community boundaries" (W3C 2013) and can
be seen as an integrator for various content, applications and information systems. Tim Berners-
Lee had the first vision of data network power (Berners-Lee 2007) processed by machines:
(Berners-Lee 2004)
“I have a dream for the Web [in which computers] become capable of analyzing all the data on the
Web – the content, links, and transactions between people and computers. A Semantic Web

Nicolae Sfetcu: Blockchain Design and Modelling
2
, which should make this possible, has yet to emerge, but when it does, the day-to-day
mechanisms of trade, bureaucracy and our daily lives will be handled by machines talking
to machines. The intelligent agents people have touted for ages will finally materialize.”
(Berners-Lee 2000)
Metadata and semantic Web technologies have allowed the application of ontologies for
the provenance of knowledge. Computational ontology research can be useful at the economic
level (including for companies), socially, and for other researchers, contributing to the
development of specific applications. (Kim and Laskowski 2016)
Many researchers regard computational ontology as a kind of applied philosophy. (Tom
Gruber 2008) In the paper "Toward Principles for the Design of Ontologies Used for Knowledge
Sharing," Tom Gruber delivers a deliberate definition of ontology as a technical term in the field
of informatics. (Thomas Gruber 1994) Gruber introduced the term as a specification of
conceptualization:
"An ontology is a description (like a formal specification of a program) of the concepts and
relationships that can exist for an agent or a community of agents. This definition is
consistent with the usage of ontology as set-of-concept-definitions, but more general. And
it is certainly a different sense of the word than its use in philosophy." (Tom Gruber 1992)
To distance ontologies from taxonomies, Gruber said: (Tom Gruber 1993)
"Ontologies are often equated with taxonomic hierarchies of classes, but class definitions, and the
subsumption relation, but ontologies need not be limited to these forms. Ontologies are
also not limited to conservative definitions, that is, definitions in the traditional logic sense
that only introduce terminology and do not add any knowledge about the world (Enderton,
1972) . To specify a conceptualization one needs to state axioms that do constrain the
possible interpretations for the defined terms." (Tom Gruber 1993)
Feilmayr and Wöß have refined this definition: "An ontology is a formal, explicit
specification of a shared conceptualization that is characterized by high semantic expressiveness
required for increased complexity." (Feilmayr and Wöß 2016)

3
One of the most elaborated ontologies in this regard is the ontology of traceability (Kim,
Fox, and Gruninger 1995) which helped to develop the TOVE ontologies for enterprise modeling
(Fox and Grüninger 1998) considered as the main source for blockchain design.
Blockchain design is based on the fundamental principles of the Internet architecture:
survival (Internet communications must continue despite network or gateway loss), variety of
service types (multiple types of communications services), variety of networks (multiple types of
networks), distributed resource management, profitability, ease of hosting, and responsibility in
resource use. (Hardjono, Lipton, and Pentland 2018)
Blockchain models
The most widely used blockchain modelling system, by abstract representation, description
and definition of structure, processes, information and resources, is the enterprises modelling.
(Leondes and Jackson 1992) Enterprise modelling uses domain ontologies by model representation
languages. (Vernadat 1997)
Based on component-based design, blockchain ontology decomposes blocks into
functional or logical individual components, and identifies the possibilities, assisting in designing,
implementing, and measuring the performance of different block architectures. (Tasca and Tessone
2017) According to Paolo Tasca, the methodological approach is basically composed of the
following steps:
1. Comparative study of different blocks: vocabulary and term analysis to solve ambiguities
and disagreements
2. Definition of the framework: identification and classification of components, defining a
hierarchical ontology

4
3. Categorization of levels: Different aspects are introduced and compared for components
from the lowest level of the hierarchical structure.
Like any ICT technology, a blockchain is driven by the fundamental principles of data
decentralization, transparency, security and confidentiality. (Aste, Tasca, and Matteo 2017) Other
fundamental features of blockchain include data automation and data storage capability.
According to Fox and Gruninger, from a design perspective, a business model should
provide the language used to explicitly define an enterprise. (Fox and Grüninger 1998) From the
perspective of operations, the enterprise modelling must be able to represent what is planned and
what has happened, and provide the information and knowledge needed to support operations.
(Fox and Grüninger 1998) Functions are modeled through a structured representation (FIPS PUBS
1993) a graphical representation in a field defined to identify information needs, identify
opportunities and determine costs. (Department Of Defense (DOD) Records Management (RM)
1995) Other perspectives may be behavioral, organizational, or informational. (Koskinen 2000)
An appropriate blockchain functional modelling focuses on the process, using four symbols
for this purpose:
• Process: Illustrates the transformation from input to output.
• Storage: Collecting data or other material.
• Flow: Moves data or materials into the process.
• External entity: External to the modelling system but interacting with it.
A process can be represented as a network of these symbols. In Dynamic Enterprise
Modeling (DEMO), for example, a decomposition is done in the control model, function model,
process model, and organizational model.

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Data modelling uses the application of formal descriptions in a database. (Whitten, Bentley,
and Dittman 2004) The data model will consist of entities, attributes, relationships, integrity rules
and object definitions, being used to design the interface or the database.
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