Towards Machine-actionable FAIR Digital Objects with a Typing Model that Enables Operations

FAIR Digital Objects support research data management aligned with the FAIR principles. They provide a machine-actionable and harmonized metadata layer on top of existing systems and specifications. However, the typing models used in current Data Type Registries lack mechanisms for inheritance and to associate operations with data types. We build on the existing concepts and present a typing model that enables reusable, technology-agnostic FAIR Digital Object Operations associated with data types. The Integrated Data Type and Operations Registry with Inheritance System is a prototype of our typing model that supports data type inheritance, rule-based validation, and the computation of type-operation associations. We conclude that this work substantially advances the machine-actionability of FAIR Digital Objects, paving the way towards dynamic, interoperable, and reproducible research workflows.