Biographical sketches of authors

Ljiljana Stojanovic FZI-Research Center for Information Technologies, University of Karlsruhe, Haid-und-Neu-Strasse 10-14, 76131 Karlsruhe, Germany (ljiljana.stojanovic@fzi.de). Ljiljana Stojanovic is a research assistant in the Knowledge Management (WIM) research department at the FZI Research Center for Information Technologies at the University of Karlsruhe. Her research interests include ontology development, evolution, and evaluation, and the use of ontologies for the continuous improvement of knowledge management systems. She received a B.S. degree in electrical engineering in 1994 and an M.S. degree in computer science in 1998, both from the Faculty of Electrical Engineering, University of Nis, Yugoslavia.

Juergen Schneider IBM Systems and Technology Group, IBM Germany Laboratory, Schoenaicher Strasse 220, 71032 Boeblingen, Germany (jschnei1@de.ibm.com). Juergen Schneider joined IBM in 1986 and has worked in various development projects as technical leader for IBM zSeries^® software. He has over 10 years experience in zSeries systems management, including performance management, operation, and automation. He is currently the lead architect for IBM Tivoli System Automation products, which involve correlation and inference technologies and which provide automated operations and high availability services for all IBM eServer^® products. He is a member of several IBM design councils.

Alexander Maedche FZI-Research Center for Information Technologies, University of Karlsruhe, Haid-und-Neu-Strasse 10-14, 76131 Karlsruhe, Germany (maedche@fzi.de). Dr. Maedche was department manager of the Knowledge Management (WIM) research department at the FZI Research Center for Information Technologies at the University of Karlsruhe until 2003. He received a diploma in industrial engineering in 1999 from the University of Karlsruhe, majoring in computer science and operations research, and a Ph.D. degree in 2001 in applied informatics, also from the University of Karlsruhe. His research interests include knowledge discovery in data and text, ontology management and learning, and using ontologies in enterprise applications and the Semantic Web. He is a member of IEEE and GI. His homepage at http://www.fzi.de/wim/ contains more information on recent publications, presentations, and events organized.

Susanne Libischer IBM Systems and Technology Group, IBM Germany Laboratory, Schoenaicher Strasse 220, 71032 Boeblingen, Germany (libische@de.ibm.com). Mrs. Libischer is manager of eServer Technical Operations and Development at the IBM Germany Laboratory in Boeblingen. In this role she leads several technical support functions, including a data center with several hundred heterogeneous test and development systems. In addition, she is responsible for development projects aiming at improving the manageability of Linux^®-based systems. Prior to taking over her current responsibility in 2001, Mrs. Libischer held various technical and management positions in IBM zSeries software development and marketing. These included software test, development, maintenance, and project management functions. Recently, her main focus has been on improving the functionality of IBM's systems management products for zSeries products in the areas of configuration, performance, and workload management, as well as automation. Mrs. Libischer graduated with a bachelor's degree in business administration from the University of Cooperative Education in Stuttgart and joined IBM in 1982.

Rudi Studer Institut für Angewandte Informatik und Formale Beschreibungsverfahren – AIFB, Universität Karlsruhe, D-76128 Karlsruhe, Germany (www.aifb.uni-karlsruhe.de/WBS). Dr. Studer is a full professor in Applied Informatics at the University of Karlsruhe, Institute AIFB. His research interests include knowledge management, Semantic Web technologies and applications, Web services, ontology engineering, knowledge discovery and eLearning. He obtained a diploma degree in computer science in 1975, and a Ph.D. degree in mathematics and computer science in 1982, both from the University of Stuttgart. In 1985, he completed his Habilitation in computer science at the University of Stuttgart. From 1977 to 1985, he worked as a research scientist at the University of Stuttgart. From 1985 to 1989, he was a project leader and manager at the IBM Germany Scientific Center. He is director of the Knowledge Management Group at the FZI Research Center for Information Technologies at the University of Karlsruhe (www.fzi.de/wim), a member of the L3S Learning Lab in Hanover (www.learninglab.de), and a co-founder of the company ontoprise GmbH (www.ontoprise.de), which develops semantic technologies. He is president of the Semantic Web Science Association and Editor-in-chief of the journal Web Semantics: Science, Services, and Agents on the World Wide Web.

Thomas Lumpp IBM Germany Laboratory, Schoenaicher Strasse 220, D-71032 Boeblingen, Germany (Thomas.Lumpp@de.ibm.com). Dr. Lumpp joined IBM in 1999 and has held several different positions in development projects for the System Automation product family. Currently his focus is on the strategic direction of System Automation for Multiplatforms, including an on demand integration. From 1995 to 1999, he worked in research projects on distributed control systems for industrial robots and fieldbus systems. He has received diploma degrees in automation engineering and computer science and a Ph.D. degree in computer science.

Andreas Abecker FZI-Research Center for Information Technologies, University of Karlsruhe, Haid-und-Neu-Strasse 10-14, 76131 Karlsruhe, Germany (Andreas.Abecker@fzi.de). Andreas Abecker received a diploma degree in computer science and economics in 1994 from Kaiserslautern University in Germany. He then worked as a researcher, senior consultant, and project manager at DFKI (the German Research Center for Artificial Intelligence) on topics such as knowledge representation, data mining, organizational memory, and business-process-oriented knowledge management. Since 2003 he has managed the Knowledge Management (WIM) department at the Research Center for Information Technology (FZI) at the University of Karlsruhe. His current research interests include the Semantic Web and Semantic Web services, as well as knowledge management and business intelligence applications.

Gerd Breiter IBM Germany Laboratory, Schoenaicher Strasse 220, D-71032 Boeblingen, Germany (gbreiter@de.ibm.com). Gerd Breiter is a Senior Technical Staff Member working on the architecture of the IBM on demand infrastructure. Prior to that he worked on the architecture and design of rich media integration for WebSphere^®/J2EE^® Business Applications and on the architecture and design of transaction and recognition systems in the banking industry. His technical interests involve advanced Web technologies, especially in the areas of Web services and grid computing environments.

John Dinger IBM Software Group, 3039 Cornwallis Road, Research Triangle Park, North Carolina 27709 (dingerj@us.ibm.com). Mr. Dinger is a Senior Technical Staff Member in Availability and Business Services Management in the Tivoli Division of the IBM Corporation. Since 2001 he has led architectural development of event correlation, business services, and network management products. Prior to this he worked in the field of systems and network management for telecommunications service providers and traditional enterprise information technology organizations. This included networking communications protocol implementation in both hardware and software. He received a B.S. degree in electrical engineering in 1981 from North Carolina State University.