A dataflow platform for applications based on Linked Data

Modern software applications increasingly benefit from accessing the multifarious and heterogeneous Web of Data, thanks to the use of web APIs and Linked Data principles. In previous work, the authors proposed a platform to develop applications consuming Linked Data in a declarative and modular way. This paper describes in detail the functional language the platform gives access to, which is based on SPARQL (the standard query language for Linked Data) and on the dataflow paradigm. The language features interactive and meta-programming capabilities so that complex modules/applications can be developed. By adopting a declarative style, it favours the development of modules that can be reused in various specific execution context

Collaborative tagging as a knowledge organisation and resource discovery tool

The purpose of the paper is to provide an overview of the collaborative tagging phenomenon and explore some of the reasons for its emergence. Design/methodology/approach - The paper reviews the related literature and discusses some of the problems associated with, and the potential of, collaborative tagging approaches for knowledge organisation and general resource discovery. A definition of controlled vocabularies is proposed and used to assess the efficacy of collaborative tagging. An exposition of the collaborative tagging model is provided and a review of the major contributions to the tagging literature is presented. Findings - There are numerous difficulties with collaborative tagging systems (e.g. low precision, lack of collocation, etc.) that originate from the absence of properties that characterise controlled vocabularies. However, such systems can not be dismissed. Librarians and information professionals have lessons to learn from the interactive and social aspects exemplified by collaborative tagging systems, as well as their success in engaging users with information management. The future co-existence of controlled vocabularies and collaborative tagging is predicted, with each appropriate for use within distinct information contexts: formal and informal. Research limitations/implications - Librarians and information professional researchers should be playing a leading role in research aimed at assessing the efficacy of collaborative tagging in relation to information storage, organisation, and retrieval, and to influence the future development of collaborative tagging systems. Practical implications - The paper indicates clear areas where digital libraries and repositories could innovate in order to better engage users with information. Originality/value - At time of writing there were no literature reviews summarising the main contributions to the collaborative tagging research or debate

Knowledge Organization Systems (KOS) in the Semantic Web: A Multi-Dimensional Review

Since the Simple Knowledge Organization System (SKOS) specification and its SKOS eXtension for Labels (SKOS-XL) became formal W3C recommendations in 2009 a significant number of conventional knowledge organization systems (KOS) (including thesauri, classification schemes, name authorities, and lists of codes and terms, produced before the arrival of the ontology-wave) have made their journeys to join the Semantic Web mainstream. This paper uses "LOD KOS" as an umbrella term to refer to all of the value vocabularies and lightweight ontologies within the Semantic Web framework. The paper provides an overview of what the LOD KOS movement has brought to various communities and users. These are not limited to the colonies of the value vocabulary constructors and providers, nor the catalogers and indexers who have a long history of applying the vocabularies to their products. The LOD dataset producers and LOD service providers, the information architects and interface designers, and researchers in sciences and humanities, are also direct beneficiaries of LOD KOS. The paper examines a set of the collected cases (experimental or in real applications) and aims to find the usages of LOD KOS in order to share the practices and ideas among communities and users. Through the viewpoints of a number of different user groups, the functions of LOD KOS are examined from multiple dimensions. This paper focuses on the LOD dataset producers, vocabulary producers, and researchers (as end-users of KOS).Comment: 31 pages, 12 figures, accepted paper in International Journal on Digital Librarie

Report of the Stanford Linked Data Workshop

The Stanford University Libraries and Academic Information Resources (SULAIR) with the Council on Library and Information Resources (CLIR) conducted at week-long workshop on the prospects for a large scale, multi-national, multi-institutional prototype of a Linked Data environment for discovery of and navigation among the rapidly, chaotically expanding array of academic information resources. As preparation for the workshop, CLIR sponsored a survey by Jerry Persons, Chief Information Architect emeritus of SULAIR that was published originally for workshop participants as background to the workshop and is now publicly available. The original intention of the workshop was to devise a plan for such a prototype. However, such was the diversity of knowledge, experience, and views of the potential of Linked Data approaches that the workshop participants turned to two more fundamental goals: building common understanding and enthusiasm on the one hand and identifying opportunities and challenges to be confronted in the preparation of the intended prototype and its operation on the other. In pursuit of those objectives, the workshop participants produced:1. a value statement addressing the question of why a Linked Data approach is worth prototyping;2. a manifesto for Linked Libraries (and Museums and Archives and …);3. an outline of the phases in a life cycle of Linked Data approaches;4. a prioritized list of known issues in generating, harvesting & using Linked Data;5. a workflow with notes for converting library bibliographic records and other academic metadata to URIs;6. examples of potential “killer apps” using Linked Data: and7. a list of next steps and potential projects.This report includes a summary of the workshop agenda, a chart showing the use of Linked Data in cultural heritage venues, and short biographies and statements from each of the participants

Ontology mapping by concept similarity

This paper presents an approach to the problem of mapping ontologies. The motivation for the research stems from the Diogene Project which is developing a web training environment for ICT professionals. The system includes high quality training material from registered content providers, and free web material will also be made available through the project's "Web Discovery" component. This involves using web search engines to locate relevant material, and mapping the ontology at the core of the Diogene system to other ontologies that exist on the Semantic Web. The project's approach to ontology mapping is presented, and an evaluation of this method is described

IVOA Recommendation: SAMP - Simple Application Messaging Protocol Version 1.3

SAMP is a messaging protocol that enables astronomy software tools to interoperate and communicate. IVOA members have recognised that building a monolithic tool that attempts to fulfil all the requirements of all users is impractical, and it is a better use of our limited resources to enable individual tools to work together better. One element of this is defining common file formats for the exchange of data between different applications. Another important component is a messaging system that enables the applications to share data and take advantage of each other's functionality. SAMP builds on the success of a prior messaging protocol, PLASTIC, which has been in use since 2006 in over a dozen astronomy applications and has proven popular with users and developers. It is also intended to form a framework for more general messaging requirements

Bridging the gap between social tagging and semantic annotation: E.D. the Entity Describer

Semantic annotation enables the development of efficient computational methods for analyzing and interacting with information, thus maximizing its value. With the already substantial and constantly expanding data generation capacity of the life sciences as well as the concomitant increase in the knowledge distributed in scientific articles, new ways to produce semantic annotations of this information are crucial. While automated techniques certainly facilitate the process, manual annotation remains the gold standard in most domains. In this manuscript, we describe a prototype mass-collaborative semantic annotation system that, by distributing the annotation workload across the broad community of biomedical researchers, may help to produce the volume of meaningful annotations needed by modern biomedical science. We present E.D., the Entity Describer, a mashup of the Connotea social tagging system, an index of semantic web-accessible controlled vocabularies, and a new public RDF database for storing social semantic annotations

Ontologies on the semantic web

As an informational technology, the World Wide Web has enjoyed spectacular success. In just ten years it has transformed the way information is produced, stored, and shared in arenas as diverse as shopping, family photo albums, and high-level academic research. The “Semantic Web” was touted by its developers as equally revolutionary but has not yet achieved anything like the Web’s exponential uptake. This 17 000 word survey article explores why this might be so, from a perspective that bridges both philosophy and IT

Heliophysics Event Knowledgebase for the Solar Dynamics Observatory and Beyond

The immense volume of data generated by the suite of instruments on SDO requires new tools for efficient identifying and accessing data that is most relevant to research investigations. We have developed the Heliophysics Events Knowledgebase (HEK) to fill this need. The HEK system combines automated data mining using feature-detection methods and high-performance visualization systems for data markup. In addition, web services and clients are provided for searching the resulting metadata, reviewing results, and efficiently accessing the data. We review these components and present examples of their use with SDO data.Comment: 17 pages, 4 figure