Authors
Alexandru Toader, Michael Kohlhase, & Andrea Kohlhase
Abstract
Spreadsheets are user-level tools that can be used for modeling personal, business and scientific data and supporting decision-making based on such models. Moreover, spreadsheets are used for communicating data, models, and decisions, which makes the interpretability of spreadsheets intents an important consideration in the design of spreadsheet interaction.
In this paper we will focus on the problem of model assessment, i.e. the process of passing judgements on a situation modeled in a spreadsheet based on the spreadsheet data, for instance the development of profit in a controlling spreadsheet.
We present a framework for specifying, documenting and personalizing assessments semi-formally and a set of plugins for the Semantic Alliance Architecture that can visualize assessments to the (spreadsheet) user.
Sample
We give the spreadsheet creators the opportunity to document the background knowledge – not in a human-readable "manual", but in a machine-actionable structured background ontology and link meaning-carrying fragments of the spreadsheets to concepts in the background ontology.
In our system the background ontology is represented in the OMDoc format, a markup format and data model for semi-formal, structured document collections.
Our approach is materialized as the Semantic Illustration architecture.
Publication
2015, Software Engineering Methods in Spreadsheets at ICSE, May, pages 14-20
