Knowware - the third star after Hardware and Software

This book proposes to separate knowledge from software and to make it a commodity that is called knowware. The architecture, representation and function of Knowware are discussed. The principles of knowware engineering and its three life cycle models: furnace model, crystallization model and spiral model are proposed and analyzed. Techniques of software/knowware co-engineering are introduced. A software component whose knowledge is replaced by knowware is called mixware. An object and component oriented development schema of mixware is introduced. In particular, the tower model and ladder model for mixware development are proposed and discussed. Finally, knowledge service and knowware based Web service are introduced and compared with Web service. In summary, knowware, software and hardware should be considered as three equally important underpinnings of IT industry.