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Reference Manual |
The Concept Mapper tool is used to organize and structure an ontology. The Concept Mapper provides a drawing canvas for graphically defining concepts and relationships between concepts. These concepts can then be mapped automatically into the Object Modeling Tool. Note that you are not required to use the Concept Mapper. You can work directly with the Object Modeler if desired.
The Concept Mapper contains a menu bar with five items: File , Edit , Map , Windows , and Help . The File menu allows you to open ontologies and save the current ontology. You can also print the ontology to obtain a hard copy of the concept information. You can also close the Concept Mapper and shut down AgentBuilder using the File menu. The Edit menu allows you to Cut , Copy , Paste or Delete a selected concept or link. The Map menu allows you to modify the current concept map by adding new concepts or links. The Map menu also provides menu items for clearing the whole canvas or refreshing the map. The Windows menu allows you to quickly and easily switch between the various open AgentBuilder tools. The Help menu gives you access to the AgentBuilder help system. A conceptual map drawn using the Concept Mapper is shown in Figure 14.
Figure 14. The Concept Mapper
The central feature of the Concept Mapper is the canvas you use to construct an arbitrarily complex representation of concepts and relations between the concepts. You are free to construct as simple or complex a concept map as desired. In addition, the concept properties allow you to create an object that will be used in the Object Modeler. It is easy to rearrange concepts to simplify the structure and minimize overlap of links. Three types of links are supported: undirect, direct, and bidirect. Each link can have a label attached to it that represents the type of relationship between two connected concepts.
You can create a new concept by right-clicking on an unoccupied region of the canvas and selecting New Concept from the pop-up menu. This will cause AgentBuilder to display a dialog where you can enter a name for the concept being represented as well as a description of the concept and any critical information that will be helpful. Also, there is a selection box titled Make Class. By clicking on this box, you can create an associated class that will appear in the Object Modeler. Thus, you do not have to enter common information into both tools. Clicking the OK button will create a new concept on the canvas. This concept is represented by an oval with the concept name located inside it. Note that the point on the canvas where you right-click is the location where the concept will be placed. If you decide not to create this new concept, you can click on the Cancel button and the concept map will remain unchanged. You can also use the Map menu to create a New Concept in a similar manner.
Concepts can be cut, copied, or pasted. There are two ways to use the clipboard functions for a concept. The first way is to use the Edit menu's Cut , Copy and Paste menu items. The other method is to use the concept's pop-up menus for cut and copy, and the map's pop-up menu for paste. Whichever method is used, a concept must be selected before a cut or copy operation. If the map being pasted into already contains the name of the concept being pasted, the concept to be pasted will recursively have CopyOf prepended to its name.
You can create a new link by right-clicking on any unoccupied region of the canvas and selecting the hierarchical New Link menu item. You can select between undirected, directed and bidirected links. You can select one of the link types from the Map < New Link hierarchical menu. Once you have selected one of the link types, the cursor will change to a cross-hair and your can then click-and-drag on the initial concept and join it to another desired concept. Note that for the undirected and bidirected cases, the order of connection does not matter. However, for the directed case, you must connect them in the direction you wish the arrow to point (the second concept is defined by where you release the mouse button).
You can freely move a concept anywhere on the canvas. Do this by clicking on the desired concept and dragging the concept to the new location. Links will adjust themselves to maintain the connection with the relocated concept.
You are able to move multiple concepts at a time. First, you need to select the concepts you wish to move. To do this, hold the Control key down and select the concepts with the mouse. Once you have a group of selected concepts, hold the Control key down and drag one of the selected concepts to a new location. You will notice that all the selected concepts will move in relation to the mouse cursor. To deselect the concepts, simply click on the canvas.
You can delete an existing concept by clicking on that concept (i.e., selecting it) and then right-clicking and selecting the Delete item from the pop-up menu. Likewise, a selected concept can be deleted using the Delete item in the Edit menu. Note that when a concept is deleted, all links to that concept are also deleted.
You can delete an existing link either by selecting a link (turning it to a red color) and then right-clicking and selecting Delete from the pop-up menu or using the Delete menu item in the Edit menu.
You can change an existing link by selecting that link and right-clicking to bring up a pop-up menu. You can then changes the link type by selecting one of the types from the Link Type hierarchical menu. The link type can also be changed in the Link Properties dialog.
You can view and modify the name and description of an existing concept by right-clicking on the desired concept. You can then select the Properties item from the pop-up menu. AgentBuilder will then display a dialog that will allow you to see and alter the name and description of the selected concept. By clicking on the OK button, you can enter the changes. Clicking on the Cancel button will revert to the original unaltered properties. The Concept Properties Dialog is shown in Figure 15.
Figure15. The Concept Properties Dialog
You can create an associated class (that can be viewed inside the Object Modeler tool) by right-clicking on a concept and selecting the Properties item from the pop-up menu. AgentBuilder will then display the Concept Properties dialog (See Viewing and Altering the Properties of an Existing Concept.). To create the class, simply click the mouse button inside the box labeled Make Class and then press the OK button to confirm the change. AgentBuilder will then automatically create the class. You can then view and modify the class inside the Object Modeler (see Object Modeler).
You can view and modify the link label, description and type of a selected link by right-clicking on the selected (red) link. Select the Properties item from the pop-up menu. AgentBuilder will then display a dialog that will allow you to see and alter the name and description of the selected link. In addition, the link type can be modified here. By clicking on the OK button, you can enter the changes. Clicking on the Cancel button will revert to the original unaltered properties. The Link Properties dialog is shown in Figure 16.
Figure 16. Link Properties Dialog
You can save a concept map by selecting Save under the File menu. You can then close the Concept Mapper and return to it at a later time. The save action will save the concept and links as well as their locations relative to each other.
The concept map can be saved to a text file by selecting File < Generate Printable . Selecting this menu item will bring up a file dialog for saving a concept map to a file. By default, the directory is set to the current working directory, and the filename is set to concept-map-name.txt . The text file that is generated will contain a text description of all of the concepts in the concept map. Currently, no information is printed about concept links. Figure 17 shows the contents of the DefaultOntology concept map.
Figure 17. Concept Map Generate Printable Output
If you wish to delete everything on the current concept map and start again, you can do so by selecting Clear under the Map menu or right-clicking on an unoccupied portion of the canvas and selecting Clear in the pop-up menu. Note that this removes all concepts and links that have been entered. AgentBuilder will warn you by displaying a confirmation dialog window. Select Yes if you wish to clear the current concept map or No if you decide not to clear the canvas. Note that if you later decide you like the previous concept map and have not saved the current concept map since clearing it, you can close the Concept Mapper and not save the changes. However, if you save after clearing the concept map, there is no way to revert to the previous concept map.
The Windows menu is a dynamic menu that contains a list of all AgentBuilder tools that are open. This menu facilitates switching between the tools when multiple tools are open. To switch to the desired tool, select the tool from the Windows menu. The selected tool will then be displayed.
The help system can be accessed using the Help menu item. The About menu item allows you to read the help information for the current tool. The Index menu item will display an index to the help system's contents. The Tutorial menu item will display the Quick Tour of the AgentBuilder toolkit. The About AgentBuilder menu item will display the AgentBuilder logo along with the version number and copyright information. The AgentBuilder Home Page menu item will display the home page for the AgentBuilder product.
You can close the Concept Mapper by selecting the Close item in the File menu. If necessary, AgentBuilder will ask you whether you want to save your changes. In selecting Yes , you will save all changes since the previous save. Selecting No will revert to the concept map configuration last saved.