Kingsley Idehen's Blog Data Space

Courtesy a post by Chris Bizer to the LOD community mailing list, here is a list of Linked Data oriented talks at the upcoming XTech 2008 event (also see the XTech 2008 Schedule which is Linked Data friendly). Of course, I am posting this to my Blog Data Space with the sole purpose of adding data to the rapidly growing Giant Global Graph of Linked Data, basically adding to my collection of live Linked Data utility demos :-)

Here is the list:

1. Linked Data Deployment (Daniel Lewis, OpenLink Software)
2. The Programmes Ontology (Tom Scott, BBC and all)
3. SemWebbing the London Gazette (Jeni Tennison, The Stationery Office)
4. Searching, publishing and remixing a Web of Semantic Data (Richard Cyganiak, DERI Galway)
5. Building a Semantic Web Search Engine: Challenges and Solutions (Aidan Hogan, DERI Galway)
6. 'That's not what you said yesterday!' - evolving your Web API (Ian Davis, Talis)
7. Representing, indexing and mining scientific data using XML and RDF: Golem and CrystalEye (Andrew Walkingshaw, University of Cambridge)

For the time challenged (i.e. those unable to view this post using it's permalink / URI as a data source via the OpenLink RDF Browser, Zitgist Data Viewer, DISCO Hyperdata Browser, or Tabulator), the benefits of this post are as follows:

• automatic URI generation for all linked items in this post
• automatic propagation of tags to del.icio.us, Technorati, and PingTheSemanticWeb
• automatic association of formal meanings to my Tags using the MOAT Ontology
• automatic collation and generation of statistical data about my tags using the SCOT Ontology (*missing link is a callout to SCOT Tag Ontology folks to sort the project's home page URL at the very least*)
• explicit typing of my Tags as SKOS Concepts.

Put differently, I cost-effectively contribute to the GGG across all Web interaction dimensions (1.0, 2.0, 3.0) :-)

1. End to Buzzword Blur - how buzzwords are used to obscure comprehension of core concepts. Let SKOS, MOAT, SCOT reign!
2. End of Data Silos - you don't own me, my data, my data's mobility (import/export), or accessibility (by reference) just because I signed up for Yet Another Software as Service (ySaaS)
3. End of Misinformation - Sins of omission will no longer go unpunished the era of self induced amnesia due to competitive concerns is over, Co-opetition shall reign (Ray Noorda always envisoned this reality)
4. Serendipitous information and data discovery gets cheaper by the second - you're only a link away for a universe of relevant and accessible data
5. Rise of Quality - Contrary to historic president (due to all of the above) well engineered solutions will no longer be sure indicators of commercial failure

BTW - Benjamin Nowack penned an interesting post titled: Semantic Web Aliases, that covers a variety of labels used to describe the Semantic Web. The great thing about this post is that it provides yet another demonstration-in-the-making for the virtues of Linked Data :-)

Labels are harmless when their sole purpose is the creation of routes of comprehension for concepts. Unfortunately, Labels aren't always constructed with concept comprehension in mind, most of the time they are artificial inflectors and deflectors servicing marketing communications goals.

Anyway, irrespective of actual intent, I've endowed all of the labels from Bengee's post with URIs as my contribution important disambiguation effort re. the Semantic Web:

• Semantic Web (timbl)
• Web of Data (timbl)
• lowercase semantic [wW]eb (tantek)
• Semantic Web 2.0 (by stefandecker, IIRC)
• Web 3.0 (by nova and others)
• Semantic Graph (by nova and others)
• Hyperdata (by danja) Linked Data (by timbl, and implemented by the Chris Bizer and Richard Cyganiak inspired, Linking Open Data Community and it's poster project DBpedia)
• Linked Data Web (by kidehen)
• Structured Web (by mkbergman)
• Semantic Data Web (by kidehen)
• SemWeb (by the developer community)
• GGG - The Giant Global Graph (by timbl) Web 3G (by iand)

As per usual this post is best appreciated when processed via an Linked Data aware user agent.

Daniel Lewis has published another post about OpenLink Data Spaces (ODS) functionality titled:A few new features in OpenLink Data Spaces, that exposes additional features (some hot out the oven).

OpenLink Data Spaces (ODS) now officially supports:

• Attention Profiling Markup Language (APML).
• Meaning of a Tag (MOAT) in conjunction with Simple Knowledge Organisation System (SKOS) and Social-Semantic Cloud of Tags (SCOT).
• OAuth - an Open Authentication Protocol

Which means that OpenLink Data Spaces support all of the main standards being discussed in the DataPortability Interest Group!

APML Example:

All users of ODS automatically get a dynamically created APML file, for example: APML profile for Kingsley Idehen

The URI for an APML profile is: http://myopenlink.net/dataspace/<ods-username>/apml.xml

Meaning of a Tag Example:

All users of ODS automatically have tag cloud information embedded inside their SIOC file, for example: SIOC for Kingsley Idehen on the Myopenlink.net installation of ODS.

But even better, MOAT has been implemented in the ODS Tagging System. This has been demonstrated in a recent test blog post by my colleague Mitko Iliev, the blog post comes up on the tag search: http://myopenlink.net/dataspace/imitko/weblog/Mitko%27s%20Weblog/tag/paris

Which can be put through the OpenLink Data Browser:

• OpenLink Data Browser with Mitko Iliev’s Paris Blog Tag

OAuth Example:

OAuth Tokens and Secrets can be created for any ODS application. To do this:

1. you can log in to MyOpenlink.net beta service, the Live Demo ODS installation, an EC2 instance, or your local installation
2. then go to ‘Settings’
3. and then you will see ‘OAuth Keys’
4. you will then be able to choose the applications that you have instantiated and generate the token and secret for that app.

Related Document (Human) Links

• OpenLink Data Spaces Official Page
• OpenLink Software Page
• OpenLink Data Spaces Wikipedia Page
• Attention Profiling Markup Language Project Website
• Meaning of a Tag Project Website
• Simple Knowledge Organisation Systems Project Website
• Social-Semantic Cloud of Tags Project Website
• OAuth Protocol Website
• DataPortability.org Website
• Semantically Interlinked Online Communities Project Website
  

Remember (as per my most recent post about ODS), ODS is about unobtrusive fusion of Web 1.0, 2.0, and 3.0+ usage and interaction patterns. Thanks to a lot of recent standardization in the Semantic Web realm (e.g SPARQL), we are now employ the MOAT, SKOS, and SCOT ontologies as vehicles for Structured Tagging.

Structured Tagging?

This is how we take a key Web 2.0 feature (think 2D in a sense), bend it over, to create a Linked Data Web (Web 3.0) experience unobtrusively (see earlier posts re. Dimensions of Web). Thus, nobody has to change how they tag or where they tag, just expose ODS to the URLs of your Web 2.0 tagged content and it will produce URIs (Structured Data Object Identifiers) and a lnked data graph for your Tags Data Space (nee. Tag Cloud). ODS will construct a graph which exposes tag subject association, tag concept alignment / intended meaning, and tag frequencies, that ultimately deliver "relative disambiguation" of intended Tag Meaning (i.e. you can easily discern the taggers meaning via the Tags actual Data Space which is associated with the tagger). In a nutshell, the dynamics of relevance matching, ranking, and the like, change immensely without futile timeless debates about matters such as:

What's the Linked Data value proposition?

What's the Linked Data business model?

XML vs RDF

XQuery vs SPARQL

What's the Semantic Web Killer application?

We can just get on with demonstrating Linked Data value using what exists on the Web today. This is the approach we are deliberately taking with ODS.

Related Items

Stefano Mazzocch's response to Clay Shirky's 2005 talk titled: Ontology is Overrated: Links, Tags and Post-hoc Metadata

Tom Gruber's post titled: Ontology of Folksonomy: A Mash-up of Apples and Oranges

Tip: This post is best viewed via an RDF aware User Agent (e.g. a Browser or Data Viewer). I say this because the permalink of this post is a URI in a Linked Data Space (My Blog) comprised of more data than meets the eye (i.e. what you see when you read this post via a Document Web Browser) :-)

Last week we officially released Virtuoso 5.0.1 (in Commercial and Open Source Editions). The press release provided us with an official mechanism and timestamp for the current Virtuoso feature set.

A vital component of the new Virtuoso release is the finalization of our SQL to RDF mapping functionality -- enabling the declarative mapping of SQL Data to RDF. Additional technical insight covering other new features (delivered and pending) is provided by Orri Erling, as part of a series of post-Banff posts.

Why is SQL to RDF Mapping a Big Deal?

A majority of the world's data (especially in the enterprise realm) resides in SQL Databases. In addition, Open Access to the data residing in said databases remains the biggest challenge to enterprises for the following reasons:

1. SQL Data Sources are inherently heterogeneous because they are acquired with business applications that are in many cases inextricably bound to a particular DBMS engine
2. Data is predictably dirty
3. DBMS vendors ultimately hold the data captive and have traditionally resisted data access standards such as ODBC (*trust me they have, just look at the unprecedented bad press associated with ODBC the only truly platform independent data access API. Then look at how this bad press arose..*)

Enterprises have known from the beginning of modern corporate times that data access, discovery, and manipulation capabilities are inextricably linked to the "Real-time Enterprise" nirvana (hence my use of 0.0 before this becomes 3.0).

In my experience, as someone whose operated in the data access and data integration realms since the late '80s, I've painfully observed enterprises pursue, but unsuccessfully attain, full control over enterprise data (the prized asset of any organization) such that data-, information-, knowledge-workers are just a click away from commencing coherent platform and database independent data drill-downs and/or discovery that transcend intranet, internet, and extranet boundaries -- serendipitous interaction with relevant data, without compromise!

Okay, situation analysis done, we move on..

At our most recent (12th June) monthly Semantic Web Gathering, I unveiled to TimBL and a host of other attendees a simple, but powerful, demonstration of how Linked Data, as an aspect of the Semantic Data Web, can be applied to enterprise data integration challenges.

Actual SQL to RDF Mapping Demo / Experiment

Hypothesis

Apparatus

Experiment / Demo

1. Declaratively map the Northwind SQL Schema to RDF using the Virtuoso Meta Schema Language (see: Virtuoso PL based Northwind_SQL_RDF script)
2. Start browsing the data by clicking on the URIs that represent the RDF Data Model Entities resulting from the SQL to RDF Mapping

Observations

1. Via a single Data Link click I was able to obtain specific information about the Customer represented by the URI "ALFKI" (act of URI Dereferencing as you would an Object ID in an Object or Object-Relational Database)
2. Via a Dynamic Data Page I was able to explore all the entity relationships or specific entity data (i.e Exploratory or Entity specific dereferencing) in the Northwind Data Space
3. I was able to perform similar exploration (as per item 2) using our OpenLink Browser.

Conclusions

The vision of data, information, or knowledge at your fingertips is nigh! Thanks to the infrastructure provided by the Semantic Data Web (URIs, RDF Data Model, variety of RDF Serialization Formats[1][2][3], and Shared Data Dictionaries / Schemas / Ontologies [1][2][3][4][5]) it's now possible to Virtualize enterprise data from the Physical Storage Level, through the Logical Data Management Levels (Relational), up to a Concrete Conceptual Model (Graph) without operating system, development environment or framework, or database engine lock-in.

Next Steps

We produce a shared ontology for the CRM and Business Reporting Domains. I hope this experiment clarifies how this is quite achievable by converting XML Schemas to RDF Data Dictionaries (RDF Schemas or Ontologies). Stay tuned :-)

Also watch TimBL amplify and articulate Linked Data value in a recent interview.

Other Related Matters

To deliver a mechanism that facilitates the crystallization of this reality is a contribution of boundless magnitude (as we shall all see in due course). Thus, it is easy to understand why even "her majesty", the queen of England, simply had to get in on the act and appoint TimBL to the "British Order of Merit" :-)

Note: All of the demos above now work with IE & Safari (a "remember what Virtuoso is epiphany") by simply putting Virtuoso's DBMS hosted XSLT engine to use :-) This also applies to my earlier collection of demos from the Hello Data Web and other Data Web & Linked Data related demo style posts.

A quick dump that demonstrates how I integrate tags and links from del.icio.us with links from my local bookmark database via one of my public Data Spaces (this demo uses the kidehen Data Space).

SPARQL (query language for the Semantic Web) basically enables me to query a collection of typed links (predicates/properties/attributes) in my Data Space (ODS based of course) without breaking my existing local bookmarks database or the one I maintain at del.icio.us.

I am also demonstrating how Web 2.0 concepts such as Tagging mesh nicely with the more formal concepts of Topics in the Semantic Web realm. The key to all of this is the ability to generate RDF Data Model Instance Data based on Shared Ontologies such as SIOC (from DERI's SIOC Project) and SKOS (again showing that Ontologies and Folksonomies are complimentary).

This demo also shows that Ajax also works well in the Semantic Web realm (or web dimension of interaction 3.0) especially when you have a toolkit with Data Aware controls (for SQL, RDF, and XML) such as OAT (OpenLink Ajax Toolkit). For instance, we've successfully used this to build a Visual Query Building Tool for SPARQL (alpha) that really takes a lot of the pain out of constructing SPARQL Queries (there is much more to come on this front re. handling of DISTINCT, FILTER, ORDER BY etc..).

For now, take a look at the SPARQL Query dump generated by this SIOC & SKOS SPARQL QBE Canvas Screenshot.

You can cut and paste the queries that follow into the Query Builder or use the screenshot to build your variation of this query sample. Alternatively, you can simply click on *This* SPARQL Protocol URL to see the query results in a basic HTML Table. And one last thing, you can grab the SPARQL Query File saved into my ODS-Briefcase (the WebDAV repository aspect of my Data Space).

Note the following SPARQL Protocol Endpoints:

1. MyOpenLink Data Space
2. Experimental Data Space SPARQL Query Builder (you need to register at http://myopenlink.net:8890/ods to use this version)
3. Live Demo Sever
4. Demo Server SPARQL Query Builder (use: demo for both username and pwd when prompted)

My beautified Version of the SPARQL Generated by QBE (you can cut and paste into "Advanced Query" section of QBE) is presented below:

PREFIX rdf: <http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#>
PREFIX sioc: <http://rdfs.org/sioc/ns#>
PREFIX dct: <http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/>
PREFIX skos: <http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/core#>


SELECT distinct 
       ?forum_name, 
       ?owner, 
       ?post, 
       ?title, 
       ?link, 
       ?url, 
       ?tag
FROM <http://myopenlink.net/dataspace>
WHERE {
       ?forum a sioc:Forum;
                   sioc:type "bookmark";
                   sioc:id ?forum_name;
                   sioc:has_member ?owner.
       ?owner sioc:id "kidehen".
       ?forum sioc:container_of ?post .
       ?post  dct:title ?title .
       optional { ?post sioc:link ?link  }
       optional { ?post sioc:links_to ?url }
       optional { ?post sioc:topic ?topic.
                        ?topic a skos:Concept;
                                  skos:prefLabel ?tag}.
     } 

Unmodified dump from the QBE (this will be beautified automatically in due course by the QBE):

PREFIX rdf: <http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#>
PREFIX sioc: <http://rdfs.org/sioc/ns#>
PREFIX dct: <http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/>
PREFIX skos: <http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/core#>


SELECT ?var8 ?var9 ?var13 ?var14 ?var24 ?var27 ?var29 ?var54 ?var56
WHERE
{
graph ?graph {
 ?var8 rdf:type sioc:Forum .
 ?var8 sioc:container_of ?var9 .
 ?var8 sioc:type "bookmark" .
 ?var8 sioc:id ?var54 .
 ?var8 sioc:has_member ?var56 .
 ?var9 rdf:type sioc:Post .
 OPTIONAL {?var9 dc:title ?var13} .
 OPTIONAL {?var9 sioc:links_to ?var14} .
 OPTIONAL {?var9 sioc:link ?var29} .
 ?var9 sioc:has_creator ?var37 .
 OPTIONAL {?var9 sioc:topic ?var24} .
 ?var24 rdf:type skos:Concept .
 OPTIONAL {?var24 skos:prefLabel ?var27} .
 ?var56 rdf:type sioc:User .
 ?var56 sioc:id "kidehen" .
 }
} 

Current missing items re. Visual QBE for SPARQL are:

1. Ability to Save properly to WebDAV so that I can then expose various saved SPARQL Queries (.rq file) from my Data Space via URIs
2. Handling of DISTINCT, FILTERS (note: OPTIONAL is handled via dotted predicate-links)
3. General tidying up re. click event handling etc.

1. Export some bookmarks from your local browser to the usual HTML bookmarks dump file
2. Create an ODS-Bookmarks Instance using your new ODS account
3. Use the ODS-Bookmark Instance to import your local bookmarks from the HTML dump file
4. Repeat the same import sequence using the ODS-Bookmark Instance, but this time pick the del.icio.us option
5. Build your query (change 'kidehen' to your ODS-user-name)
6. That's it you now have Semantic Web presence in the form of a Data Space for your local and del.icio.us hosted bookmarks with tags integrated

Quick Query Builder Tip: You will need to import the following (using the Import Button in the Ontologies & Schemas side-bar);

1. http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns# (RDF)
2. http://rdfs.org/sioc/ns# (SIOC)
3. http://purl.org/dc/elements/1.1/ (Dublin Core)
4. http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/core# (SKOS)

Browser Support: The SPARQL QBE is SVG based and currently works fine with the following browsers; Firefox 1.5/2.0, Camino (Cocoa variant of Firefox for Mac OS X), Webkit (Safari pre-release / advanced sibling), Opera 9.x. We are evaluating the use of the Adobe SVG plugin re. IE 6/7 support.

Of course this should be a screencast, but I am the middle of a plethora of things right now :-)

A new technical white paper about our declarative language for SQL Schema to RDF Ontology Mapping has just been published.

What is this?

A declarative language adapted from SPARQL's graph pattern language (N3/Turtle) for mapping SQL Data to RDF Ontologies. We currently refer to this as a Graph Pattern based RDF VIEW Definition Language.

Why is it important?

It provides an effective mechanism for exposing existing SQL Data as virtual RDF Data Sets (Graphs) negating the data duplication associated with generating physical RDF Graphs from SQL Data en route to persistence in a dedicated Triple Store.

Enterprise applications (traditional and web based) and most Web Applications (Web 1.0 and Web 2.0) sit atop relational databases, implying that SQL/RDF model and data integration is an essential element of the burgeoning "Data Web" (Semantic Web - Layer 1) comprehension and adoption process.

In a nutshell, this is a quick route for non disruptive exposure of existing SQL Data to SPARQL supporting RDF Tools and Development Environments.

How does it work?

RDF Side

1. locate one or more Ontologies (e.g FOAF, SIOC, AtomOWL, SKOS etc.) that effectively defines the Concepts (Classes) and Terms (Predicates) to be exposed via your RDF Graph
2. Using the Virtuoso's RDF View Definition Language declare a International Resource Identifier (or URI) for your Graph. Example:

   CREATE GRAPH IRI("http://myopenlink.net/dataspace")

3. Then create Classes (Concepts), Class Properties/Predicates (Memb), and Class Instances (Inst) for the new Graph. Example:

   CREATE IRI CLASS odsWeblog:feed_iri  "http://myopenlink.net/dataspace/kidehen/weblog/MyFeeds" (
     in memb varchar not null, in inst varchar not null)

SQL Side

1. If Virtuoso isn't your SQL Data Store, Identify the ODBC or JDBC SQL data source(s) containing the SQL data to be mapped to RDF and then link the relevant tables into Virtuoso's Virtual DBMS Layer
2. Then use the RDF View Definition Language's graph pattern feature to generate SQL to RDF Mapping Template for your Graph. As shown in this ODS Weblog -> AtomOWL Mapping example.

Another example of Data Spaces in action by John Breslin.. In this case John visualizes the connections that are exploitable by creating SIOC (Semantically-Interlinked Online Communities) instance data from existing Distributed Collaborative Application profiles (Web 2.0 in current parlance). Of course, SIOC is an Ontology for RDF data since it describes the Concepts and Terms for a a network mesh of online communities. Which by implication provides another insight into the realization that the Web we know has always been a "Web of Databases" (federation of Graph Model Databases encapsulated in Data Spaces). The emergence of SPARQL as the standard Query Language for querying RDF Data Sets, alongside the SPARQL Protocol for transmitting SPARQL Queries over HTTP, and the SPARQL Query Results Serialization formats (XML or JSON) Results Serialization Format), basically set the stage truly open and flexible data access across Web Data Space clusters such as: the Blogosphere, Wikispehere, Usenetverse, Linkspaces, Boardscapes, and others.

For additional clarity re. my comments above, you can also look at the SPARQL & SIOC Usecase samples document for our OpenLink Data Spaces platform. Bottom line, the Semantic Web and SPARQL aren't BORING. In fact, quite the contrary, since they are essential ingredients of a more powerful Web than the one we work with today!

Enjoy the rest of John's post:

Creating connections between discussion clouds with SIOC:

(Extract from our forthcoming BlogTalk paper about browsers for SIOC.)

SIOC provides a unified vocabulary for content and interaction description: a semantic layer that can co-exist with existing discussion platforms. Using SIOC, various linkages are created between the aforementioned concepts, which allow new methods of accessing this linked data, including:

• Virtual Forums. These may be a gathering of posts or threads which are distributed across discussion platforms, for example, where a user has found posts from a number of blogs that can be associated with a particular category of interest, or an agent identifies relevant posts across a certain timeframe.
• Distributed Conversations. Trackbacks are commonly used to link blog posts to previous posts on a related topic. By creating links in both directions, not only across blogs but across all types of internet discussions, conversations can be followed regardless of what point or URI fragment a browser enters at.
• Unified Communities. Apart from creating a web page with a number of relevant links to the blogs or forums or people involved in a particular community, there is no standard way to define what makes up an online community (apart from grouping the people who are members of that community using FOAF or OPML). SIOC allows one to simply define what objects are constituent parts of a community, or to say to what community an object belongs (using sioc:has_part / part_of): users, groups, forums, blogs, etc.
• Shared Topics. Technorati (a search engine for blogs) and BoardTracker (for bulletin boards) have been leveraging the free-text tags that people associate with their posts for some time now. SIOC allows the definition of such tags (using the subject property), but also enables hierarchial or non-hierarchial topic definition of posts using sioc:topic when a topic is ambiguous or more information on a topic is required. Combining with other Semantic Web vocabularies, tags and topics can be further described using the SKOS organisation system.
• One Person, Many User Accounts. SIOC also aims to help the issue of multiple identities by allowing users to define that they hold other accounts or that their accounts belong to a particular personal identity (via foaf:holdsOnlineAccount or sioc:account_of). Therefore, all the posts or comments made by a particular person using their various associated user accounts across platforms could be identified.

(Via Danny Ayers.):

This Week’s Semantic Web:

"Ok, my first attempt at a round-up (in response to Phil’s observation of Planetary damage). Thanks to the conference there’s loads more here than there’s likely to be subsequent weeks, although it’s still only a fairly random sample and some of the links here are to heaps of other resources…
Incidentally, if anyone’s got a list/links for SemWeb-related blogs that aren’t on Planet RDF, I’d be grateful for a pointer. PS. Ok, I forget… are there any blogs that aren’t on Dave’s list yet..?

Quote of the week:

In the Semantic Web, it is not the Semantic which is new, it is the Web which is new.

- Chris Welty, IBM (lifted from TimBL’s slides)

Events

• 4th International Semantic Web Conference - happened this week, see : ISWC2005 Semantic Bank
• Semantic Desktop Workshop, 9-13 December 2005, Berlin
• Semantic Web Applications and Perspectives/Workshop (SWAP2005), 14-16 December, 2005
• Jena User Conference - May 10-11 2006, Bristol UK

Docs etc

• Conference highlights on the #swig chump: 2005-11-06, -07, -08, -09, -10; Ian’s notes; John’s resources; Leo’s stories; Uldis’ call to action; del.icio.us/iswc2005; flickr/iswc2005; foaf-moblog.
• Slides from Sir TimBL’s conference keynotes: Semantic Web for the Industry, Putting the Web back in Semantic Web
• Daniel Weitzner’s keynote: Privacy, Provenance, Property and Personhood
• Long-time SW researcher Stefan Decker now has a blog, inspirationally entitled Stefan Decker on the Semantic Web. (Stefan’s one of the head honchos at DERI). Sample snippet:
  

  I just noticed the article from Dan Zambonini ‘Is Web 2.0 killing the Semantic Web?‘. From my perspective the article shows a misconception that people seems to have around the Semantic Web: the Semantic Web effort itself is not provide applications (like the Web 2.0 meme indicates) - it rather provides standards to interlink applications.

• Leigh Dodds has two pieces demonstrating neat facilities offered by ARQ the SPARQL query API for Java: parameterised queries and extension functions.
• A new W3C Working Group has been chartered: Rule Interchange Format WG - ’ to produce a core rule language plus extensions which together allow rules to be translated between rule languages and thus transferred between rule systems.’. As noted by dajobe, phase 1 includes making a new XML syntax for RDF…
• UMBC Semantic Web Reference Card - if you only print one thing this year…or did you already do the SPARQL Reference card..?
• WebDescription - root wiki page for collecting notes on web description languages (ESW Wiki, announcement)
• Bot - IRC/Jabber chat bots that are either in use by Semantic Web developers or use Semantic Web technologies (ESW Wiki)
• microformat FAQs for RDF fans (ESW Wiki)
• W3C working draft : WSDL 2.0 - RDF Mapping
• SKOS (Simple Knowledge Organisation System) updated drafts: SKOS Core Vocabulary Specification, SKOS Core Guide
• working draft: SPARQL Protocol for RDF Using WSDL 1.1
• A relational algebra for SPARQL, Note on database layouts for SPARQL datastores (PDFs, Richard Cyganiak, HP)
• Amateur Fiction Online - The Web of Community Trust A Case Study in Community Focused Design for the SemanticWeb (PDF)
• Building a Semantic Wiki - IEEE article. See also: SemperWiki - Semantic Personal Wiki, WikSAR - Towards a Semantic Wiki Experience
  

Software and stuff

• Semantic Web Challenge applications (winner: CONFOTO - congrats bengee!)
• Piggy Bank 2.1.1 released.
• IRIS is a semantic desktop application framework that enables users to create a ‘personal map’ across their office-related information objects. IRIS includes a machine-learning platform to help automate this process. It provides ‘dashboard’ views, contextual navigation, and relationship-based structure across an extensible suite of office applications, including a calendar, web and file browser, e-mail client, and instant messaging client.
  (open source release due Jan 2006)
• MKSearch - ‘A new kind of search engine’ - RDF-backed (Sesame) with Web crawler, extracts and indexes metadata.
• FOAFRealm - Our goal is to design and implement D-FOAF, a distributed authentication and trust infrastructure without a centralised authority. D-FOAF will be a backbone for trust applications based on social relationships and will establish identity of users similar to the way we establish identify and trust in real life.
• Perl Net::Flickr::RDF
• WordPress SIOC (Semantically-Interlinked Online Communities) plugin updated (just copy wp-sioc.php into the root of your WP install and it just works)
• OntoMedia is intended for the representation of heterogenous media through description of the semantic content of that media. The representation may be limited to the description of some or all of the elements contained within the source or may include information regarding the narrative relationship that these elements have both to the media and to each other.
• mSpace is an interaction model to help explore relationships in information - ‘Imagine Google on iTunes’

Blog post title of the week:

Don’t give me that monkey-ass Web 1.0, either

- Uche Ogbuji

Also…a new threat to Semantic Web developers has been discovered: typhoid!, and the key to the Web’s full potential is…Tetris."