Introduction

Owlready2 is a package for manipulating OWL 2.0 ontologies in Python. It can load, modify, save ontologies, and it supports reasoning via HermiT (included). Owlready allows a transparent access to OWL ontologies.

Owlready2 can:

  • Import ontologies in RDF/XML, OWL/XML or NTriples format.

  • Manipulates ontology classes, instances and annotations as if they were Python objects.

  • Add Python methods to ontology classes.

  • Re-classify instances automatically, using the HermiT reasoner.

  • Import medical terminologies from UMLS (see PyMedTermino2).

If you need to “convert” formulas between Protégé, Owlready2 and/or Description Logics, the following cheat sheet may be of interest:

The great table of Description Logics and formal ontology notations

Short example: What can I do with Owlready?

Load an ontology from a local repository, or from Internet:

>>> from owlready2 import *
>>> onto_path.append("/path/to/your/local/ontology/repository")
>>> onto = get_ontology("http://www.lesfleursdunormal.fr/static/_downloads/pizza_onto.owl")
>>> onto.load()

Create new classes in the ontology, possibly mixing OWL constructs and Python methods:

>>> class NonVegetarianPizza(onto.Pizza):
...   equivalent_to = [
...     onto.Pizza
...   & ( onto.has_topping.some(onto.MeatTopping)
...     | onto.has_topping.some(onto.FishTopping)
...     ) ]

...   def eat(self): print("Beurk! I'm vegetarian!")

Access the classes of the ontology, and create new instances / individuals:

>>> onto.Pizza
pizza_onto.Pizza

>>> test_pizza = onto.Pizza("test_pizza_owl_identifier")
>>> test_pizza.has_topping = [ onto.CheeseTopping(),
...                            onto.TomatoTopping() ]

In Owlready2, almost any lists can be modified in place, for example by appending/removing items from lists. Owlready2 automatically updates the RDF quadstore.

>>> test_pizza.has_topping.append(onto.MeatTopping())

Perform reasoning, and classify instances and classes:

>>> test_pizza.__class__
onto.Pizza

>>> # Execute HermiT and reparent instances and classes
>>> sync_reasoner()

>>> test_pizza.__class__
onto.NonVegetarianPizza
>>> test_pizza.eat()
Beurk! I'm vegetarian !

Export to OWL file:

>>> onto.save()

Load Gene Ontology (GO), a large ontology (~ 170 Mb, can take a moment!):

>>> go = get_ontology("http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/go.owl").load()

Access entities with an IRI that does not start with the ontology’s IRI, by creating a Namespace:

>>> obo = get_namespace("http://purl.obolibrary.org/obo/")

>>> print(obo.GO_0000001.label)
['mitochondrion inheritance']

Architecture

Owlready2 maintains a RDF quadstore in an optimized database (SQLite3), either in memory or on the disk (see Worlds). It provides a high-level access to the Classes and the objects in the ontology (aka. ontology-oriented programming). Classes and Invididuals are loaded dynamically from the quadstore as needed, cached in memory and destroyed when no longer needed.