The Implicit Pattern Problem
Ontology developers embed design patterns without realizing it. These patterns solve real problems, but they’re never explicitly published as reusable modules.
The result: valuable modeling solutions are locked inside complex ontologies. Domain experts who could benefit from these patterns can’t access them without navigating entire ontological structures they don’t understand.
The patterns exist. The documentation doesn’t.
This creates a recurring dynamic: each new ontology development effort rediscovers solutions that already existed elsewhere, because there’s no accessible catalog of what’s already been figured out.