WebProtege is a highly customizable Web interface for browsing and editing ontologies, which provides support for collaboration. We have created a customized version to support the World Health Organization with the collaborative development of the 11th revision of the International Classi cation of Diseases (ICD-11). Our demo will present this customized version and focus on how content creation and collaboration is being supported in WebProtege for the development of ICD-11.
The International Classi cation of Diseases (ICD) is a public global standard
that organizes and classi es information about diseases and related health
problems [
In 2007, the WHO initiated the 11th revision of ICD. Several ambitious goals
were set for this version (details in [
Our group has been working closely with the WHO to provide the technical
support for these ambitious goals. We have created a customized version of
WebProtege speci cally designed to support the ICD authoring process. In [
Ontology Repository SNOMED Mappings
ICD ChAO interacts with imports
IND
Mappings ICD Umbrella
UMLS Mappings
ICD ICD Content
Model Java / RMI
WebProtégé Server Side
UI Configuration
Services Collaboration
Services
BioPortal Services
ICD
Services
Java / RMI Collaboration Framework
Notes Change
API Tracking API Workflow
User Management
Ontology
Access API
Access Policies WebProtégé servlets
BioPortal
REST calls
2 WebProtege| Authoring Platform for ICD-11
WebProtege is a pluggable and extensible platform for authoring ontologies. The
tool was designed such that it could be customized for each project according
to its own requirements. This is particularly important for the ICD revision
project, as it is still in its infancy, many fundamental issues and requirements
are unde ned. Our tools need to be adaptable on the y when changes are made
to the content model, user-interface requirements, and work ow. In the following
sections, we brie y describe the architecture and highlight some of the features
of the user interface.
2.1 Architecture
Figure 1 shows a high level architecture diagram and the interaction of the
software components for the customized version of WebProtege. The core
functionality of the application is supported by the Protege server, which provides
access to the ontology content, such as retrieving and changing classes,
properties and individuals in the ontology. The ontologies that the server accesses
are stored in a database on the server side. The Collaboration Framework [
Both WebProtege and the \traditional" Protege desktop client can connect
through the Collaboration Framework to interact with the ontology. Support
for importing terms from existing terminologies was one of the requirements
for the ICD-11 revision. In order to search external biomedical terminologies
and to import terms from these terminologies, WebProtege accesses BioPortal,
a repository of about 200 biomedical ontologies and terminologies [
For the ICD-11 revision project, we had to take into consideration that most of the ICD editors are domain experts, mainly medical doctors, who do not have backgrounds in ontology engineering. We con gured the customized version of WebProtege to use simple Web-based entry forms with elds that correspond to the attributes of the ICD content model. We have tried to ensure that the user interface does not look like an ontology editing environment, but is a customized experience for the domain experts.
The customized WebProtege user interface is shown in Figure 2. The user interface is organized in a series of tabs: MyICD, ICD Content, Category Notes and Discussion, Reviews, Change History and Manage Hierarchy tab. Each tab presents a certain piece of functionality to the user.
The main functionality of WebProtege is the support for browsing and editing ontologies on the Web. Editing support is available in the ICD Content tab. Medical experts from all over the world are using the system to edit ICD-11 simultaneously. Each change by an editor is immediately committed and visible to other editors of ICD-11.
Another key piece of functionality is collaborative support. This is critical in such a large distributed project. Editors can use WebProtege to add notes to classes, properties, and individuals in the ontology. This allows authors to raise questions and discuss di erent issues that arise during editing. The WHO plans to use a peer review process to ensure quality of the ICD content model. In the current version, WebProtege supports a prototypical implementation of this feature. A user with appropriate permissions can request the review of a disease description.
WebProtege uses a declarative user interface where the user interface components and layout is speci ed in an XML con guration le. The con guration can be changed on the y, allowing the interface to be updated without recompiling or re-deploying the application. This feature provides great exibility for customizing WebProtege. 3
We have brie y presented a customization of WebProtege, a web-based tool for distributed collaborative development of ontologies. The WHO is using WebProtege as the primary development environment for ICD-11. Developers of other terminologies within the WHO Family of International Classi cations (WHO-FIC) are beginning to use WebProtege as well. In the demo session, we will demonstrate the main features and bene ts of WebProtege, speci cally how to create and edit the ICD content model, how to create notes and discussion threads, and import terms from Bioportal.