An Enterprise Model Repository: Architecture and System

Because of the pressure of competition and the rapidly changing business environment, organizational knowledge emerges as an important reusable resource. Knowledge management is based on the viewpoint that an organization can take proper steps to clear obstacles lying ahead and give good services to its customers by not only differentiating internal knowledge resources for competitive edges, but also managing them efficiently (Dutta, 1997). Davenport and Prusak (1998) define knowledge as a fluid mix of framed experience, values, contextual information, and expert insight. Typically, knowledge can be categorized into two types: tacit and explicit. Tacit knowledge is based on personal subjective experience and hard to formalize. In contrast, explicit knowledge is transmittable in a formal and systematic manner. Nonaka and Takeuchi (1995) investigated the dynamic knowledge creation phases, such as socialization, externalization, combination and internalization through reciprocal reactions between tacit knowledge and explicit knowledge. Effective knowledge management provides companies with strategic benefits, speeds changes, reduces cost, and enhances quality. Information technologies (eg., a groupware like Lotus Notes or Interanet) can help represent, transmit, and reduce knowledge. This may result in explicit knowledge. The repository is a general tool for knowledge management ; it can be a part of other tools such as a CASE (Computer Aided System Engineering) tool, groupware, expert systems, and decision support systems. It includes information about data, processes, physical hardware, human, and physical resources (ISO, 1990). Initial repositories have been applied to document and program source management in the development of an information system. Recently, they support wider business areas: group communication, strategic decision making, and process improvement (Visaggio, 1994; Berlin et al., 1993). The repository is one of the best tools for knowledge management. Related to knowledge management are system functions such as representation and delivery. These representation and delivery capabilities are essential for systematic knowledge management. Representation techniques, such as model, graph, and formula, are adopted for knowledge abstraction. Good representation allows users to understand and communicate with each other more effectively. At the same time, good delivery systems guarantee easy and timely knowledge acquisition. In representing and delivering knowledge, an important problem is the variety and change of knowledge representation. For instance, most repositories support popular The management of organizational knowledge has become increasingly important since knowledge was identified as the new basis of competition in post-industrial society. One of the key issues in knowledge management is to put knowledge into a repository where …