A Photovoltaic System Model Integrating FAIR Digital Objects and Ontologies^†

Round 1

Reviewer 1 Report

The topic is a timely contribution, however there is a list of comments to be addressed.

First, the authors are invited to ensure that all abbreviations are explained as soon as they appear for the first time in the text.

The statements the authors made should be better referenced - there are too many pieces of the text, which require either evidence or support from the literature

Figures should appear in the text after they are mentioned in the text

Figure 1 and DO presentation in particular differs from the one presented in EOSC document the authors refer to.

In the paper the authors apply the term FAIR to both DO and ecosystem, while the latter is not elaborated in detail. This should be done, particularly considering that expanding the scope of FAIR applicability is a current topic. For instance, see as a reference points the following:

Azeroual, O., Schöpfel, J., Pölönen, J., & Nikiforova, A. (2022, October). Putting FAIR principles in the context of research information: FAIRness for CRIS and CRIS for FAIRness. In 14th International Conference on Knowledge Management and Information Systems (KMIS2022).

Neumann, J. (2022). FAIR Data Infrastructure.

Schultes, E., & Wittenburg, P. (2018, October). FAIR Principles and Digital Objects: Accelerating convergence on a data infrastructure. In International Conference on Data Analytics and Management in Data Intensive Domains (pp. 3-16). Springer, Cham.

"Substantial information on FDOs can also be read in a newer article [6]", "For further information about FDOs and actual developments and events, a visit on the website of the FAIR Digital Object Forum is recommended." - it is not recommended not to refer the reader to the external references in this way. Please, reword.

" [14] also recommends Protégé as a tool for ontology building and this recommendation still holds today." the references supporting the statement that it is still the case today is needed. Also, in the light of different alternatives, a brief discussion would be beneficial.

The authors are invited to double-check whether FDO is a widely used and well-accrpted term.

"The model, which is already detailed n describing PV system components, has been presented in [33] and in [34]. It has been ery valuable as a template for the development of the PV ontology introduced in this work. " then why another approach is needed? This should be discussed in detail.

The authors distinguish between different types of metadata, which is a good approach, but a discussion on whether this is their own definition or retrieved from the literature is needed. The current research suggests several classifications, so I assume it is reused, then the references are needed.

"or by looking for hints during the retrieval of " should be avoided and discussed in detail

The paper lacks the section devoted to the limitations.

Since the paper is submitted to the collection of selected papers based on the results of the conference, the authors are invited to double checked whether it is mentioned in the paper with a proper reference to the conference paper.

Considering the topic of the paper, is the source code and other supplementary materials made available supporting open science movement? This would also facilitate replicability and reproducibility of the study.

The involvement of the native speaker would be beneficial.

Author Response

1. First, the authors are invited to ensure that all abbreviations are explained as soon as they appear for the first time in the text.

We hopefully found all abbreviations that where not introduced correctly.

2. The statements the authors made should be better referenced - there are too many pieces of the text, which require either evidence or support from the literature

We added more literature supporting our statements.

3. Figures should appear in the text after they are mentioned in the text

This should be the case now.

4. Figure 1 and DO presentation in particular differs from the one presented in EOSC document the authors refer to.

The EOSC document explains the structure of a FAIR Digital Object, whereas Fig. 1 shows an illustration of a Digital Object as explained in Kahn & Wilensky 2006. In the text we now say that the figure is meant to visualize the described DO of Kahn.

5. In the paper the authors apply the term FAIR to both DO and ecosystem, while the latter is not elaborated in detail. This should be done, particularly considering that expanding the scope of FAIR applicability is a current topic. For instance, see as a reference points the following:

Thank you for the references! We had a look at them and expanded the text to talk about FAIR ecosystems.

6. "Substantial information on FDOs can also be read in a newer article [6]", "For further information about FDOs and actual developments and events, a visit on the website of the FAIR Digital Object Forum is recommended." - it is not recommended not to refer the reader to the external references in this way. Please, reword.

Reworded the cite to DeSmedt2020 and striked the linked to the FAIR-DO Forum, since it is a community platform on FDOs and not a standardization organization.

7. " [14] also recommends Protégé as a tool for ontology building and this recommendation still holds today." the references supporting the statement that it is still the case today is needed. Also, in the light of different alternatives, a brief discussion would be beneficial.

We removed the recommendation since it is not of interest in the context of the paper and we have no supporting literature that supports the statement.

8. The authors are invited to double-check whether FDO is a widely used and well-accrpted term.

In the field of metadata and data management we think FDO is a stand-alone term.

9. "The model, which is already detailed n describing PV system components, has been presented in [33] and in [34]. It has been ery valuable as a template for the development of the PV ontology introduced in this work. " then why another approach is needed? This should be discussed in detail.

We improved the text to make clear why we couldn't used the proposed ontology of [33], [34].

10. The authors distinguish between different types of metadata, which is a good approach, but a discussion on whether this is their own definition or retrieved from the literature is needed. The current research suggests several classifications, so I assume it is reused, then the references are needed.

We added a reference for the classification.

11. "or by looking for hints during the retrieval of " should be avoided and discussed in detail

We removed the fuzzy sentence and explained what is meant.

12. The paper lacks the section devoted to the limitations.

We do not see limitations of the concept.

13. Since the paper is submitted to the collection of selected papers based on the results of the conference, the authors are invited to double checked whether it is mentioned in the paper with a proper reference to the conference paper.

This is fixed!

14. Considering the topic of the paper, is the source code and other supplementary materials made available supporting open science movement? This would also facilitate replicability and reproducibility of the study.

Yes, this is a good point. Generally, we want to do this, but at a later point in time as we still have to undergo legal clearance.

Thank you very much for your detailed review!

Reviewer 2 Report

I believe that the paper can be accepted with some minor improvement mostly related to references that are missed in some parts (e.g. introduction) and, overall, do not reflect the body of knowledge for Ontology/Semantic Web.

Additionally, the abstract needs some adjustments as FAIR is mentioned without any explanation; "Basic Technologies” as a title for Section 2 doesn’t sound very well in this specific case (maybe "Underlying Technology"?).  

Author Response

1. I believe that the paper can be accepted with some minor improvement mostly related to references that are missed in some parts (e.g. introduction) and, overall, do not reflect the body of knowledge for Ontology/Semantic Web.

We added supporting literature to the introduction section that support our statements.

2. Additionally, the abstract needs some adjustments as FAIR is mentioned without any explanation;

We think that FAIR is in the field of data management a stand-alone term and we explain it in the introduction. We added the expansion of the acronym to the abstract to make clear that we are talking about the acronym.

3. "Basic Technologies” as a title for Section 2 doesn’t sound very well in this specific case (maybe "Underlying Technology"?). 

Thank you for this suggestion we liked it and changed "basic technology" to "underlying technology".

Thank you for your time doing this review!

Round 2

Reviewer 1 Report

The authors made a round of revisions and improvements, where some of the comments were taken into account and thereby integrated in the paper. More serious consideration of all previously proposed comments would allow the authors to improve the paper even better.

Paper is acceptable, however, better referencing to the existing literature, and reflecting on the limitations of the proposed approach would be beneficial. In other words, if it is stated that the literature has been studied, it should be cited in the text as well. In addition, considering that the topic of FAIRness and FAIR ecosystems is dynamic in nature, recent studies should be studied and reflected / cited in the paper. I.e., while referencing to the very first works of Wilkinson, who invented FAIR principles is well understood, the latter works (of him) should also be covered, since he studies this topic and make changes on a constant basis, e.g. https://open-research-europe.ec.europa.eu/articles/2-146. FAIR ecosystem should also be better referenced as mentioned before. Other references, considering the topicality of the topic should also be made more up-to-date.

Additionally, the limitations of approach should be identified or assumed for their further exploration since each and every proposal has its own limitations or at least a specific scope, when they will be applicable or not, and were it will or will not be as useful as for other cases. Generalization of the approach or its applicability in other domains should also be discussed.

Otherwise, the paper is of good quality and can be of interest for the readership. The topic itself is very relevant!

Author Response

First, we really thank you for your review work!

We added a section about generalization and limitations, and we did more literature research and extended the text about FAIR ecosystem. But the mentioned FAIR assessment paper does not fit in our paper. We do not want to talk about FAIR assessment, this is not part of our idea/work. We looked at further recent work of Wilkinson and added literature about the interpretation of the FAIR principles and interfaces and tools about the FAIR data point metadata repository .