4,503 research outputs found
Building a Disciplinary, World-Wide Data Infrastructure
Sharing scientific data, with the objective of making it fully discoverable,
accessible, assessable, intelligible, usable, and interoperable, requires work
at the disciplinary level to define in particular how the data should be
formatted and described. Each discipline has its own organization and history
as a starting point, and this paper explores the way a range of disciplines,
namely materials science, crystallography, astronomy, earth sciences,
humanities and linguistics get organized at the international level to tackle
this question. In each case, the disciplinary culture with respect to data
sharing, science drivers, organization and lessons learnt are briefly
described, as well as the elements of the specific data infrastructure which
are or could be shared with others. Commonalities and differences are assessed.
Common key elements for success are identified: data sharing should be science
driven; defining the disciplinary part of the interdisciplinary standards is
mandatory but challenging; sharing of applications should accompany data
sharing. Incentives such as journal and funding agency requirements are also
similar. For all, it also appears that social aspects are more challenging than
technological ones. Governance is more diverse, and linked to the discipline
organization. CODATA, the RDA and the WDS can facilitate the establishment of
disciplinary interoperability frameworks. Being problem-driven is also a key
factor of success for building bridges to enable interdisciplinary research.Comment: Proceedings of the session "Building a disciplinary, world-wide data
infrastructure" of SciDataCon 2016, held in Denver, CO, USA, 12-14 September
2016, to be published in ICSU CODATA Data Science Journal in 201
Web interaction environments : characterising Web accessibility at the large
Tese de doutoramento, Informática (Engenharia Informática), Universidade de Lisboa, Faculdade de Ciências, 2012Accessibility quality on the Web is essential for providing a good Web experience to people with disabilities. The existence of virtual ramps aid these users grasping and interacting withWeb content, just like the experience of those who are unimpaired. However, more often than not, Web pages impose accessibility barriers, usually centred on the unavailability of tailored content to specific perceptual abilities (e.g., textual description of images, enabling grasping information with assistive technologies), as well as on proper HTML structural elements that adequate the semantics of a Web page. When evaluating the accessibility quality of Web pages, the resulting analysis is often focused on a small sample set (e.g., a single Web page or a selection of pages from a Web site). While this kind of analysis gets the gist of accessibility quality, it misses the big picture on the overall accessibility quality of the Web. This thesis addresses the challenge of observing accessibility phenomena on the Web, through the experimental evaluation of large collections of Web pages. This resulted on new findings about the accessibility quality of the Web, such as its correlation with HTML element count, and the erroneous perception of accessibility quality by developers. Small-scale experiments have been verified also at large scale, such as the correlation between the usage of HTML templates and accessibility quality. Based on the challenges raised by the experimental evaluation, this thesis proposes a novel approach for large scale Web accessibility evaluation based on Linked Data, as well as the establishment of metrics to assess the truthfulness and coverage of automated evaluation methods.A qualidade da acessibilidade é um factor crucial para as pessoas com deficiências terem uma boa experiência de interacção com a Web.A qualidade da acessibilidade é um factor crucial para as pessoas com deficiências terem uma boa experiência de interacção com a Web. A existência de rampas virtuais ajuda estas pessoas a compreender e interagir com conteúdos Web, a par do que o utilizador comum já experiencia. Porém, a maioria das páginas Web ainda contêm barreiras à acessibilidade. Estas barreiras centram-se normalmente na indisponibilidade de conteúdos perceptÃveis por diferentes tipos de capacidades (e.g., descrições textuais de imagens), bem como no uso incorrecto de elementos HTML de acordo com a semântica de uma página Web. Nos dias de hoje, a avaliação da qualidade de acessibilidade de páginas Web é ainda efectuada em pequena escala (e.g., uma página Web ou, no melhor caso, um conjunto de páginas representativas de um sÃtio Web). Apesar deste tipo de avaliações resultarem na compreensão de alguns fenómenos do estado da acessibilidade na Web, ainda não se sabe qual o seu impacto em larga escala. Esta tese discute os principais desafios na observação da acessibilidade da Web, tendo por base um conjunto de avaliações experimentais de colecções de grande dimensão de páginas Web. Destes estudos destacam-se as seguintes contribuições e resultados:a diferença drástica na interpretação dos avisos resultantes de avaliações de acessibilidade Web: um dos resultados principais da avaliação experimental em larga escala destaca a diferença na interpretação dos avisos (warnings) da aplicação de técnicas da norma WCAG, onde a interpretação optimista (i.e., a visão da maioria dos criadores de páginas Web) se distancia amplamente da interpretação conservadora (onde os avisos são interpretados como erros); a correlação entre a qualidade da acessibilidade de uma página Web e a sua complexidade: este mesmo estudo de larga escala revelou uma correlação entre a complexidade de uma página Web (no que diz respeito ao número de elementos HTML que contém) e a qualidade da acessibilidade. Quanto menor a complexidade de uma página Web, mais certa se torna a alta qualidade da acessibilidade dessa página; o benefÃcio do uso de templates e sistemas de gestão de conteúdos na melhoria da acessibilidade de páginas Web: em ambos os estudos experimentais de acessibilidade foi detectada uma correlação entre a qualidade de acessibilidade das páginas Web e o uso de templates e sistemas de gestão de conteúdo. Esta propriedade foi verificada quer em pequena escala (sobre uma colecção de páginas Web da Wikipedia), quer em larga escala; o incumprimento das regras mais elementares e mais conhecidas da acessibilidade: estes estudos experimentais permitiram também verificar que, apesar de toda a envagelização e educação sobre as questões de acessibilidade na Web, a maioria das regras de acessibilidade são incessantemente quebradas pela maioria das páginas Web.Esta problemática verifica-se, em particular, nas regras de cumprimento de acessibilidade mais conhecidas, tal como por exemplo a disponibilidade de textos alternativos a conteúdos multimédia. Com base nestas experiências e resultados, esta tese apresenta um novo modelo de estudo da acessibilidade na Web, tendo por base o ciclo de estudos da Web em larga escala. Deste modelo resultaram as seguintes contribuições: um modelo para a avaliação distribuÃda de acessibilidade Web, baseado em propriedades tecnológicas e topológicas: foi concebido um modelo de avaliação de acessibilidade Web que permite a concepção de sistemas de avaliação com base em propriedades tecnológicas e topológicas. Este modelo possibilita, entre outras caracterÃsticas, o estudo da cobertura de plataformas e avaliadores de acessibilidade, bem como da sua aplicação em larga escala; uma extensão à s linguagens e modelos EARL e Linked Data, bem como um conjunto de definições para extrair informação destes: este modelo de avaliação de acessibilidade Web foi sustentado também pela sua concretização em linguagens e modelos já existentes para o estudo de acessibilidade (EARL) e da Web em larga escala (Linked Data), permitindo assim a sua validação; definição dos limites da avaliação de acessibilidade Web: por fim, este modelo de avaliação de acessibilidade permitiu também delinear uma metodologia de meta-avaliação da acessibilidade, na qual se poderão enquadrar as propriedades dos avaliadores de acessibilidade existentes. Todas estas contribuições resultaram também num conjunto de publicações cientÃficas, das quais se destacam: Rui Lopes and LuÃs Carriço, A Web Science Perspective of Web Accessibility, in submission for the ACM Transactions on Accessible Computing (TACCESS), ACM, 2011; Rui Lopes and LuÃs Carriço, Macroscopic Characterisations of Web Accessibility, New Review of Hypermedia and Multimedia – Special Issue on Web Accessibility. Taylor & Francis, 2010; Rui Lopes, Karel Van Isacker and LuÃs Carriço, Redefining Assumptions: Accessibility and Its Stakeholders, The 12th International Conference on Computers Helping People with Special Needs (ICCHP), Vienna, Austria, 14-16 July 2010; Rui Lopes, Daniel Gomes and LuÃs Carriço, Web Not For All: A Large Scale Study of Web Accessibility, W4A: 7th ACM International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility, Raleigh, North Carolina, USA, 26-27 April 2010; Rui Lopes, Konstantinos Votis, LuÃs Carriço, Dimitrios Tzovaras, and Spiridon Likothanassis, The Semantics of Personalised Web Accessibility Assessment, 25th Annual ACM Symposium on Applied Computing (SAC), Sierre, Switzerland, 22-26 March, 2010 Konstantinos Votis, Rui Lopes, Dimitrios Tzovaras, LuÃs Carriço and Spiridon Likothanassis, A Semantic Accessibility Assessment Environment for Design and Development for the Web, HCI International 2009 (HCII 2009), San Diego, California, USA, 19-24 July 2009 Rui Lopes and LuÃs Carriço, On the Gap Between Automated and In-Vivo Evaluations of Web Accessibility, HCI International 2009 (HCII 2009), San Diego, California, USA, 19-24 July 2009; Rui Lopes, Konstantinos Votis, LuÃs Carriço, Spiridon Likothanassis and Dimitrios Tzovaras, Towards the Universal Semantic Assessment of Accessibility, 24th Annual ACM Symposium on Applied Computing (SAC),Waikiki Beach, Honolulu, Hawaii, USA, 8-12 March 2009; Rui Lopes and LuÃs Carriço, Querying Web Accessibility Knowledge from Web Graphs, Handbook of Research on Social Dimensions of Semantic Technologies, IGI Global, 2009; Rui Lopes, Konstantinos Votis, LuÃs Carriço, Spiridon Likothanassis and Dimitrios Tzovaras, A Service Oriented Ontological Framework for the Semantic Validation of Web Accessibility, Handbook of Research on Social Dimensions of Semantic Technologies, IGI Global, 2009; Rui Lopes and LuÃs Carriço, On the Credibility of Wikipedia: an Accessibility Perspective, Second Workshop on Information Credibility on the Web (WICOW 2008), Napa Valley, California, USA, 2008; Rui Lopes, LuÃs Carriço, A Model for Universal Usability on the Web, WSW 2008: Web Science Workshop, Beijing, China, 22 April 2008; Rui Lopes, LuÃs Carriço, The Impact of Accessibility Assessment in Macro Scale Universal Usability Studies of the Web, W4A: 5th ACM International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility, Beijing, China, 21-22 April 2008. Best paper award; Rui Lopes, LuÃs Carriço, Modelling Web Accessibility for Rich Document Production, Journal on Access Services 6 (1-2), Routledge, Taylor & Francis Group, 2009; Rui Lopes, LuÃs Carriço, Leveraging Rich Accessible Documents on the Web, W4A: 4th ACM International Cross-Disciplinary Conference on Web Accessibility, Banff, Canada, 7-8 May 2007.Fundação para a Ciência e a Tecnologia (FCT, SFRH/BD/29150/2006
The OpenCitations Data Model
A variety of schemas and ontologies are currently used for the
machine-readable description of bibliographic entities and citations. This
diversity, and the reuse of the same ontology terms with different nuances,
generates inconsistencies in data. Adoption of a single data model would
facilitate data integration tasks regardless of the data supplier or context
application. In this paper we present the OpenCitations Data Model (OCDM), a
generic data model for describing bibliographic entities and citations,
developed using Semantic Web technologies. We also evaluate the effective
reusability of OCDM according to ontology evaluation practices, mention
existing users of OCDM, and discuss the use and impact of OCDM in the wider
open science community.Comment: ISWC 2020 Conference proceeding
The political economy of education systems in conflict-affected contexts
This report is a rigorous literature review on the political economy of education systems in conflict-affected contexts and is aimed at education advisers and agencies, development practitioners and Ministry of Education policy makers working in conflict-affected contexts. The report seeks to provide theoretically informed and policy relevant insights on the global, national and local governance of education systems in conflict-affected contexts garnered from a rigorous review of the academic and policy literature on the political economy of education in conflict-affected contexts.
The review was driven by three main questions: (1) What are the underpinning assumptions of the main bodies of political economy research in education and conflict? (2) What can the political economy of education literature since 1990 inform us about educational change and reform in conflict-affected contexts? (3) What are the strengths, weaknesses, blind spots and research gaps in the political economy of education literature exploring the governance of educational change and reform in conflict-affected contexts?
Chapter 1 outlines the rationale and aims of the review. Chapter 2, describes the theoretical and conceptual framework and presents the framing of the key issues under review, and Chapter 3 outlines the review methodology. Chapter 4 presents the main characteristics and an assessment of the quality of the studies selected for the in-depth review, and Chapter 5, discusses the review’s main findings. Chapter 6 presents the conclusions of the study, outlines a theory of change that emerges from the findings and draws out the policy insights and research gaps for future study
The Political Economy of Education Systems in Conflict-Affected Contexts: A Rigorous Literature Review
This report is a rigorous literature review on the political economy of education systems in conflict-affected contexts and is aimed at education advisers and agencies, development practitioners and Ministry of Education policy makers working in conflict-affected contexts. The report seeks to provide theoretically informed and policy relevant insights on the global, national and local governance of education systems in conflict-affected contexts garnered from a rigorous review of the academic and policy literature on the political economy of education in conflict-affected contexts.<p></p>
The review was driven by three main questions: (1) What are the underpinning assumptions of the main bodies of political economy research in education and conflict? (2) What can the political economy of education literature since 1990 inform us about educational change and reform in conflict-affected contexts? (3) What are the strengths, weaknesses, blind spots and research gaps in the political economy of education literature exploring the governance of educational change and reform in conflict-affected contexts?<p></p>
Chapter 1 outlines the rationale and aims of the review. Chapter 2, describes the theoretical and conceptual framework and presents the framing of the key issues under review, and Chapter 3 outlines the review methodology. Chapter 4 presents the main characteristics and an assessment of the quality of the studies selected for the in-depth review, and Chapter 5, discusses the review’s main findings. Chapter 6 presents the conclusions of the study, outlines a theory of change that emerges from the findings and draws out the policy insights and research gaps for future study
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