Compounding the Results: The Integration of Virtual Worlds With the Semantic Web

Over the past 20 years, governmental use of Web-base information and technologies has continually expanded taking advantage of the Web's vast, ever- expanding volumes of browser-accessible information. Now, it infuses two new technologies, the first one espousing a world where semantic-powered applications become knowledgeable assistants for Web users. The second new technology takes a perceivably flat two-dimensional approach to presenting current Web-content and adds a three-dimensional perspective to the presentation. Welcome to the Semantic Web as seen through the eyes of a Virtual World participant, an environment where Web users no longer are browsing for information that is largely static, where Web users interact through their proxies (avatars) query applications (Web agents) soliciting them to collect, filter, verify, correlate and present answers to their queries often in a more visually palatable three-dimensional format. Following a brief overview of these two technologies, this article presents several of the key force drivers behind their evolution and the benefits gleaned from their collective use. Further discussion identifies new methods for visualizing semantic content in virtual worlds. Finally, as with any technological evolution, the merge of these two technologies brings on a whole new set of challenges from a Web userÕs perspective as well as perspectives from technology developers both in academia and government

A New Approach to Communications Management Planning Through 3D Web and Semantic Web Technologies

Communication management plans are used to determine not only who needs what information but also how that information will be collected and transmitted. Now two evolving technologies are looking to drive project planners to develop new approaches and methods for planning communications in the coming years. The first of these technologies, the Semantic Web, is becoming a driving force in how computers are making web content available to its users. The second technology, Web three-dimensional (3D) focuses on web-based content presentation by providing a rich 3D Web-centric environment for users to access information and interact with other users. This effort discusses the advent of the Semantic Web and Web 3D technologies and identifies many of the new planning considerations driving project information collection and analysis. The planning considerations for these two technologies are also discussed to aid in the framing of a new approach to project communications planning

HOMER: A semantically enhanced knowledge management approach in the domain of homemade explosives intelligence.

This paper presents a new approach, in handling data (encoding, managing and retrieving) in secure sensitive and classified organisations (such as Law Enforcement Agencies (LEAs)), that utilises Web 3.0 technologies as well as knowledge management techniques and pushing of information. This approach signals a departure from current use of databases and pulling of information technologies as well as allowing separation of concerns between how data are organised/structured and how data are manipulated/processed. Such an approach utilises an adaptive knowledge management platform capable of supporting organisational operations of LEAs using data aggregated from assorted, heterogeneous and online sources. Such knowledge is then pushed to the users, using recommenders, in an effortless manner addressing the needs of the organisation. Moreover, the system is designed to afford easier change of operational needs through the addition and removal of multiple folksonomies (representing changes in focus or new trends). These changes are further enriched with semantics providing specialised domain-specific content recommendations and semantically enriched search capabilities. This approach to knowledge retrieval has been applied to the domain of homemade explosives and counter-terrorism efforts as part of the HOMER project, where data are aggregated from sources such as police databases, online forums and explosives wikis. Data are stored in an unstructured manner and annotated by the users, ultimately being categorised as per the knowledge retrieval needs of the organisation, which in this case is to carry out efficient and effective investigations regarding homemade explosives. We describe the architecture of a system that can efficiently and effectively support related investigatory activities, and we also present an evaluation from the perspective of the end-users

Review of Web Mapping: Eras, Trends and Directions

Web mapping and the use of geospatial information online have evolved rapidly over the past few decades. Almost everyone in the world uses mapping information, whether or not one realizes it. Almost every mobile phone now has location services and every event and object on the earth has a location. The use of this geospatial location data has expanded rapidly, thanks to the development of the Internet. Huge volumes of geospatial data are available and daily being captured online, and are used in web applications and maps for viewing, analysis, modeling and simulation. This paper reviews the developments of web mapping from the first static online map images to the current highly interactive, multi-sourced web mapping services that have been increasingly moved to cloud computing platforms. The whole environment of web mapping captures the integration and interaction between three components found online, namely, geospatial information, people and functionality. In this paper, the trends and interactions among these components are identified and reviewed in relation to the technology developments. The review then concludes by exploring some of the opportunities and directions

Where can teens find health information? A survey of web portals designed for teen health information seekers

The Web is an important source for health information for most teens with access to the Web (Gray et al, 2005a; Kaiser, 2001). While teens are likely to turn to the Web for health information, research has indicated that their skills in locating, evaluating and using health information are weak (Hansen et al, 2003; Skinner et al, 2003, Gray et al, 2005b). This behaviour suggests that the targeted approach to finding health information that is offered by web portals would be useful to teens. A web portal is the entry point for information on the Web. It is the front end, and often the filter, that users must pass through in order to link to actual content. Unlike general search engines such as Google, content that is linked to a portal has usually been pre-selected and even created by the organization that hosts the portal, assuring some level of quality control. The underlying architecture of the portal is structured and thus offers an organized approach to exploring a specific health topic. This paper reports on an environmental scan of the Web, the purpose of which was to identify and describe portals to general health information, in English and French, designed specifically for teens. It answers two key questions. First of all, what portals exist? And secondly, what are their characteristics? The portals were analyzed through the lens of four attributes: Usability, interactivity, reliability and findability. Usability is a term that incorporates concepts of navigation, layout and design, clarity of concept and purpose, underlying architecture, in-site assistance and, for web content with text, readability. Interactivity relates to the type of interactions and level of engagement required by the user to access health information on a portal. Interaction can come in the form of a game, a quiz, a creative experience, or a communication tool such as an instant messaging board, a forum or blog. Reliability reflects the traditional values of accuracy, currency, credibility and bias, and in the web-based world, durabililty. Findability is simply the ease with which a portal can be discovered by a searcher using the search engine that is most commonly associated with the Web by young people - Google - and using terms related to teen health. Findability is an important consideration since the majority of teens begin their search for health information using search engines (CIBER, 2008; Hansen et al, 2003). The content linked to by the portals was not evaluated, nor was the portals’ efficacy as a health intervention. Teens looking for health information on the Web in English have a wide range of choices available but French-language portals are much rarer and harder to find. A majority of the portals found and reviewed originated from hospitals, associations specializing in a particular disease, and governmental agencies, suggesting that portals for teens on health related topics are generally reliable. However, only a handful of the portals reviewed were easy to find, suggesting that valuable resources for teens remain buried in the Web

Semantic discovery and reuse of business process patterns

Patterns currently play an important role in modern information systems (IS) development and their use has mainly been restricted to the design and implementation phases of the development lifecycle. Given the increasing significance of business modelling in IS development, patterns have the potential of providing a viable solution for promoting reusability of recurrent generalized models in the very early stages of development. As a statement of research-in-progress this paper focuses on business process patterns and proposes an initial methodological framework for the discovery and reuse of business process patterns within the IS development lifecycle. The framework borrows ideas from the domain engineering literature and proposes the use of semantics to drive both the discovery of patterns as well as their reuse