From NeOn Wiki

Frequently Asked Questions

How do I load an ontology? The NeOn Toolkit is organized in Ontology projects which "host" the ontologies. Thus, in order to load an ontology into the toolkit you shoul Import it into an existing project. To do so, right-click on the project folder and choose IMPORT. The import wizards guides you through the process. Choose NeOn Toolkit (ontologies) >> Ontology Import (Filesystem). Then select an appropriate ontology file via the file-chooser and hit "finish". The selected ontology or ontologies will be loaded and displayed as children of the initially selected project-folder.

How can I use a proxy for network access? Go to "Preferences/Editors/Network Configuration" and configure your proxy settings manually.

What has to be done to launch the NeOn Toolkit on a Linux system? In order to use the NeOn_Toolkit.sh to launch the NeOn Toolkit under Linux, you have to set the executable bit for the following two files like that:

  • $ chmod a+x NeOn_Toolkit
  • $ chmod a+x NeOn_Toolkit.sh

I have a 64-Bit Linux system and want to use the NeOn Toolkit. Is it possible? What do I need to do? In order to use the NeOn Toolkit under a 64-bit Linux, such as Ubuntu 7.10, you need the appropriate GTK library. Please download the Eclipse SDK for Linux 64bit from eclipse.org and put the file eclipse/plugins/org.eclipse.swt.gtk.linux.x86_64_*.jar into the neon/plugins directory. The * represents the version number of the library. Finally, update the startup script NeOnToolkit.sh to refer to the new library. Please note that we currently cannot provide support for the Linux distribution of the Toolkit.


When starting the NeOn Toolkit I get an error message "MSVCR71.dll not found". The initial start program of Eclipse 3.3 appears to rely on this library to be present. It exists on most windows systems but can be missing on others, in which case you cannot run the NeOn Toolkit. If you get this error message just google for the file and download it. After copying it to the windows/system32 folder you will be able to start the NeOn Toolkit without further complications.


Why does the tool only display an empty user interface? In a few cases the installation procedure runs smoothly but produces an apparently empty user interface. We are aware of one root cause for this behaviour: usage of Java 1.4 instead of the required Java 5. If your machine is running Java 1.4 please update to the most recent Java version 5. If you are running Java 5 and still experience this problem, please report this to us as it helps us locating and solving the problem. We would be particularly interested in the Operating System and the Java version. Thank you for your collaboration and sorry for the inconvenience. (For the new Version of the NeOn Toolkit so need Java 6)


What is Eclipse? Eclipse is an open development platform and extensible framework which provides the basic infrastructure implementation on which the NeOn Toolkit is grounded. The basic extension means of Eclipse is the plug-in mechanism, which allows NeOn partners and also the Eclipse developers community to contribute functionality also to the NeOn Toolkit.


What is OntoStudio? The NeOn Toolkit is built on the code-base of OntoStudio, the commercial ontology engineering environment of ontoprise. The NeOn Toolkit is driven by the NeOn partners who provide lots of plug-ins with unigue functionalities. Please check them out by going to help > software update > find and install and follow the simple steps to install them.


I downloaded the Toolkit. What do I do next?

  • 1. If the file you download is an archive file please unzip its content in a folder, e.g. c:/NeOnToolkit/. Go to this folder and start the toolkit by double-clicking on NeOn_Tookit.exe.
  • 2. If the file you download is an executable file please double click on it and follow the instructions. To start find the NeOn Folder and NeOn_Tookit entry in Window's programs menu.
  • 3. After displaying a splash-screen the tool asks for the location of a "Workspace". The workspace is the location where the Toolkit keeps some internal information. Usually you can keep the proposed default location. Please make sure to keep this workspace separate from other Eclipse workspaces that you might use.
  • 4. Then the full Toolkit will open and display a welcome screen with some information about the project and the toolkit. This info can be closed (with the X in the top left corner) or minimized with one of the icons in the top right corner.
  • 5. The ontology navigator will be the main view for using the Toolkit. Here you can create projects, ontologies and ontology components.
  • 6. In order to load an ontology or create one manually we need a new project which hosts ontologies. Create one by right-clicking in the ontology navigator and choose "new project". The select "Ontology Development Project" and provide a name for the project.
  • 7. The context menu of the new project now offers to create a new ontology. Provide a URI as the ontology (or module) identifier and a default namespace.
  • 8. The context menu of the new project also offers to import ontologies. The appearing dialog offers multiple import filters. For files please choose "file system import wizard".


What are the system requirements for using the NeOn Toolkit?

Operating system:

  • Windows: 2000, XP Professional, Vista or 7
  • MacOS X (OS X 10.5 or newer)
  • Linux

Java platforms:

  • Sun Java 6

Hardware (minimum):

  • Pentium IV class, 2 GHz and better,
  • at least 512 MB RAM,
  • at least 100 MB hard disk space

Hardware (recommended):

  • Pentium IV class, 2 GHz and better,
  • 1 GB RAM,
  • 400 MB hard disk space


How do I implement my own plugin? In order to implement your own plug-ins please have a look at the Developer Corner.


Which plugins are available? Consult the dedicated Neon Plugins for a description of the plugins. You can also publish your own plug-ins and announce them in the Wiki.

How do I find out which plugins are installed? Under "Help>About NeOn Toolkit>Installation Details>Plug-ins" you can see all infos about the installed plugins.

What are the license conditions? The NeOn Toolkit is in three different versions:

  • a source-code version for developers
  • a basic configuration for end-users and
  • an extended configuration for end-users.

The different versions are released under different software licenses, which range from the open-source Eclipse Public License, over a free-ware license to a proprietary evaluation license for the extended configuration that contains commercial plug-ins.

Please note that we cannot distribute certain plugins within the Core installation due to licensing restrictions. For example, RaDON (released under EPL) uses either Pellet or HermiT as underlying reasoning engine which are released under GPL, which prohibits us to package the plugins directly. You have to install the plugins via the integrated update mechanism and separately confirm the GPL for the respective plugins.


Why are there two versions of the toolkit? The basic configuration contains the framework plus a few plugins to support basic modeling of F-logic and OWL ontologies. The source code of all plug-ins delivered with this configuration is available at OntoWare. It comes under the Eclipse Public License (EPL).

The extended configuration additionally contains some plugins developed by NeOn members (currently ontoprise) and provides a much richer modeling experience. This version can be used for an evaluation period of three months. For other license agreements, please contact ontoprise.

Both versions can be extended by plug-ins. The NeOn consortium is in the process of developing a multitude of plug-ins, e.g. to support collaborative modeling, or for engineering ontologies.


Where can I learn more about the NeOn project? The NeOn project is funded by the European Commission under FP6. NeOn works on Lifecycle support for Networked Ontologies. Please go to http://www.neon-project.org for more details.


What is the NeOn toolkit? The NeOn Toolkit is an ontology engineering platform developed by the EC-funded NeOn Project. It is based on the Eclipse framework and supports modeling of frame-like ontologies extended by rules and modeling of DL-ontologies. As a platform it is an extensible environment for which the NeOn partners are contributing functionality in the form of plugins.