Preface

Semantics is the research area touching the diversified domains such as: Philosophy, Information Science, Linguistics, Formal Semantics, Philosophy of Language and its constructs, Query Processing, Semantic Web, Pragmatics, Computational Semantics, Programming Languages, and Semantic Memory etc. The current book is a nice blend of number of great ideas, theories, mathematical models, and practical systems in diversified domains.

The book has been divided into two volumes. The current one is the first volume which highlights the advances in theories and mathematical models in the domain of Semantics. This volume has been divided into four sections and ten chapters. The sections include: 1) Background, 2) Queries, Predicates, and Semantic Cache, 3) Algorithms and Logic Programming, and 4) Semantic Web and Interfaces.

Section 1 presents the background and motivations for the term "Semantics". This section has two chapters. First chapter debates about the meaning of the Semantics from different perspectives whereas the second chapter presents insights about Knowledge reasoning and beliefs, subsequently, probabilistic belief logic such as: PBLw has been proposed and discussed.

Section 2 focuses on queries, predicates and semantic cache. This section has been divided into two chapters. The first chapter debates on the structure of the query, the structure of the answers, and predicate-argument relationships. Second chapter is in the domain of semantic cache. The authors present a survey of semantic cache query processing and semantic reasoners.

Section 3 presents two chapters from the domain of Algorithms and Logic Programming. The first chapter presents an extended version of Schellekens technique to provide the asymptotic upper and lower bounds of running time of a recursive algorithm, Furthermore, the relationship between denotational semantics and asymptotic complexity led to form a mathematical approach that model the running time and the meaning of recursive algorithms. Second chapter presents a semantic framework for declarative debugging of wrong and missing computed answers in Constraint Functional-Logic Programming.

Section 4 elaborates the work in the areas of Semantic Web and Interfaces. This section includes four chapters. First chapter discusses Spatialization of the Semantic Web to

#### XII Preface

manage spatial data using Semantic Web framework. The framework, ArchaeoKM, briefly conceptualizes the 4Ks such as: Knowledge Acquisition, Knowledge Management, Knowledge Visualization and Knowledge Analysis. A case study of industrial archaeology has been discussed in details. Second chapter presents a representation system based on Ontology for quality indicators. Third chapter presents a system for semantic modeling and the numerical processing to define strategies based on domain knowledge and 3D processing knowledge. The chapter, on one hand presents a brief introduction of semantic technologies such as: RDF, OWL, SWRL, DL, while one the other hand, a system has been proposed, designed, and implemented for integrating 3D processing and spatial topological components within its framework. The last chapter presents 'Command – Causalities – Consequences Wisdom' C3W semantics temporal entanglement modelling for human – machine interfaces.

I would like to thank authors who participated to conclude such a nice worth-reading book. I am also thankful to In-Tech Open access Initiative for making accessible all of the chapters online free of cost to the scientific community.

> **Dr. Muhammad Tanvir Afzal** Department of Computer Science Mohammad Ali Jinnah University, Islamabad, Pakistan
