This paper contains a taxonomy of the uses of ontologies, intended as motivation for the Ontology Definition Metamodel development
effort by the Object Management Group. It describes several usage scenarios for ontologies and proposes example applications
for use in these scenarios. Many of the scenarios and applications are based on efforts currently underway in industry and
academia. The scenarios descriptions are followed by goals for the Ontology Definition Metamodel.
The work reported in this paper has been funded in part by the Cooperative Research Centres Program through the Department
of the Prime Minister and Cabinet of the Commonwealth Government of Australia, and funded in part through the United States
Government Defense Advanced Research Program Office’s DAML program.