Daniel’s Blog

As some of you know, I am a member of the ACM and this lovely bit of news was released last week at some point, but I’ve only just noticed today because it was in the recent ACM MemberNet mailing list email.

The Semantic Web Expert Professor Wendy Hall CBE FREng of the University of Southampton, has won the election to be the President of the Association for Computing Machinery (ACM) between 2008 and 2010.

Well done Wendy, and Good Luck!

More information on the Document Web about various resources mentioned:

• The ACM
• The University of Southampton and its School of Electronics and Computer Science (ECS) and the Intelligence, Agents , Mulitmedia Group.
  
• Wendy’s Homepage

Intro

In the past I have written and talked about the fact that URIs are the key (or ticket) towards making data more semantic (aka “meaningful”). A URI is a unique label for a data object, by giving a unique label to the object you can build relations up with that object, making the object more defined and more meaningful.

Except a URI is a lot more than a simple label, and this is because of the Linked Data rule of making URIs “gettable” via HTTP. Because the URI is available via HTTP it can be seen as a data structure which describes how to get to a specific data source.

And now to talk about Data Source Names (DSNs).

Data Source Names

A DSN is a data structure which represents the connection to a specific data source, this has traditionally been within the database realm and more specifically with ODBC. However, it does not have to be strictly ODBC nor strictly database… it could be any data source of any kind.

Data Source Names are synonymous with Uniform Resource Identifiers

You would have noticed that the description of the Linked Data URI and the description of the DSNs are very similar, in fact, there is no difference at all! Therefore on the Linked Data Web a Uniform Resource Identifier is a Data Source Name. Simple as that!

Now you can start to see what Kingsley, I and the rest of OpenLink are trying to convey when we mention WODBC. The Linked Data Web is fully explainable using existing database terminology (e.g. URIs are DSNs), which is then built up creating a web of data connections, establishing Web Open DataBase Connnectivity.

Kingsley gives a description of WODBC and a comparison with the traditional ODBC.

Following my previous post on “The Tribes of the Semantic Web“. There is another Semantic Tribe: The RDFization Tribe.

The RDFization(or RDFisation to be slightly more English English) Tribe. RDFization is quite a simple term to understand if you think about it, because “isation” means the process of turning into something, and RDF is RDF…. therefore RDFisation is turning something into RDF. This is a mechanical process, and therefore automatic.

RDFization will take unstructured or semistructured text and use Statistical and AI techniques (such as Natural Language Processing and Latent Semantic Indexing) in order to extract named entities (and relationships), decypher subjects and disambiguate naming.

The people that take this approach are not necessarily “Semantic Purists” (who also use AI Techniques) because the idea here is to extract data which can be linked with the relevant object (as a foreign key represents an object). With RDFization the clever stuff happens at the higher (semistructured or free text) level, rather than in the heart (data) level which the “Semantic Purists” deal with.

RDFization is theoretically the same as Alex Iskold’s “Top-Down Approach“, except I have two problems with the term “Top-Down Approach”.

1. “Top-Down”/”Bottom-up” is very one dimensional. There are lots of ways to encapsulate semantics into a data source.
2. “Top-Down”/”Bottom-up” is used in so many other aspects of computer science, and all instances of these terms tend to have different meanings or different perceptions.

The Semantic Web / Linked Data is clear, it is to provide meaning in any/every way possible whether that through annotation, fully structured descriptions, “RDFization” through AI/Statistical means or some other way.

More information about RDFization

If you do a search for RDFization on Kingsley Idehens blog, you get some very interesting blog posts about RDFization.

Kingsley Idehen, my boss, Talked with Talis earlier this month. I’ve just listened to it.

He specifically talked about the business benefits of Linked Data and the Semantic Web.

It is available: “Talking with Talis: Kingsley Idehen talks about OpenLink Software, Linked Data and the Semantic Web“.

This talk is very well worth a listen because it is very much from a business point of view. He uses very business-orientated use cases to build up the big picture of Linked Data. It is not overly technical, but the average technologist should also find the episode interesting too.

You’ll notice that Kingsley and I give descriptions in very similar ways. We both describe things in one particular way, and then describe in at least one other different way. This is incredibly important for being a good teacher and a good Technology Evangelist. The reason for doing this is because different people do different things, and different people do those things in different ways.

People have different ways of understanding different things, hence why religion/faith is so varied and hence why some people prefer an open source system and why others prefer a proprietory system. There is no way of getting away from these differences, however, it is good to build bridges between them. Therefore, a good teacher or technology evangelist will describe things in different ways, which builds bridges in between different domains of knowledge and understanding.

I’ve gone slightly off on a tangent a little, mainly because I feel very strongly about this “building bridges” model. Maybe it is a case for another blog post at some time. So, anyway, I highly recommend listening to the Talking with Talis episode with Kingsley…. very much well worth it!!!

I’ve decided two things to do for the StraightWalker wordpress theme:

1. Start an independent StraightWalker blog (with the latest release). DONE: https://www.vanirsystems.com/straightwalker
2. Release the code on googlcode. DONE: https://code.google.com/p/straightwalker/

I haven’t had much chance to look at the bug that is causing problems loading up specific posts/pages, and hopefully I will be able to soon. The code is available to download and look at if you wish, it is very buggy but you are very welcome to help me iron out the bugs and turn some of the static stuff more dynamic, just send me an email or skype message me and I’ll put you on the project member list in googlecode.

The Tribes of the Semantic Web

There are actually tribes within the Semantic Web:

These include:

• The Linked Data Purist
• The Semantic Annotator
• The Semantics Purist
• The Semantic Insider

Generally this is because they prefer a certain architecture over another, but I am not saying that each is exclusive. There are people in the community which straddle two or more of the tribes.

The Linked Data Purist

The Linked Data Purist will have links out to various open data objects, and will provide content negotiation in a Human-Friendly format (e.g. HTML) and in a Linked Data format (e.g. RDF). Languages like SPARQL and SPARUL would be provided to query and update the Internal Data Graph Model.

The Linked Data Purists Architecture

The Document Web Developer and the Linked Data Developer

Its possible to add a layer on top of the SQL based Relational Database, to create “RDF Views”. This allows the developer to play with the data in either SQL or SPARQL formats:

Linked Data WITH Document Web Architecture

The Semantic Annotator

The Semantic Annotator will use an annotation language to embed semantics into the document they are providing (whether thats XML, XHTML or HTML). Frameworks such as RDFa, Microformats, eRDF and AB Meta are used in this case:

The Semantic Annotator Architecture

The Semantic Insider

A Semantic Insider will have closed data due to privacy or licensing, they only provide an interface on the data with little or no links out, and certainly no links coming in directly to objects. The only real reason for hiding data like this is because of privacy or licensing, if privacy or licensing are not an issue then opening up the data is promoted by the Linked Data tribe.

The Semantic Inside Architecture

The Semantics Purist

The Semantics Purist enjoys getting the real semantics working for each and every object. They will use OWL extensively, and will understand Descriptions Logic. The Semantics Purist does this in order to use the many semantic inferencing tools available.

(No diagram for this one, because it varies… some aren’t web based, some are…. most use some kind of deep inferencing)

Tribes are bad, Linking is key

Tribes are bad, they split communities up when they could really do with being together and more universal… we would probably get a lot more done if we did what we were promoting not just for data but for intercommunication. Linking Data is important, yes, but Linking together between the existing tribes is even better. This is a call to those in the Semantic Web / semantic web community.

Bishop John Shelby Spong (a well known Liberal Episcopalian Christian Bishop) often talks about the Tribal Identity/Mentality of Christians through the ages. This can happen within the Web Development/Design world too, it happens to/from the Semantic Web community (e.g. some people see the Semantic Web as “too academic”, which is rubbish because most of it isn’t) and also within it (e.g. Microformats versus RDF or RDFa).

“It is a magnificent feeling to recognize the unity of complex phenomena which appear to be things quite apart from the direct visible truth” - Albert Einstein

“Where there is unity there is always victory” - Publilius Syrus

So I leave you with a picture of “Minerva of Peace” by Elihu Vedder:

Minerva of Peace by Elihu Vedder. (From Wikipedia “Minerva of Peace“)

I hoped to have a mini reports done day-by-day, but a restricted Internet service at my hotel and the venue meant that I wasn’t as able to as I wanted. So here it is, a bigger report. I’ll do it in an interview style.

What was XTech 2008 generally about?

XTech 2008 was about “The Web on the move”. It brought together innovators, researchers, developers and entrepreneurs to talk about the current state of the web, how its evolving and where its going in the future.

General Topics included:

• People being social on the Web… aka the “Social Web“
• Client Side development, particularly JavaScript/AJAX
• Semantic Web: Linked Data, FOAF, Microformats, RDFa, Ontologies, New Platforms from various businesses
• DataPortability: APML, FOAF, SIOC, XMPP

Oh! That sounds awesome, I wish I was there. When and where was it?

It was between 6th and 9th of May 2008, at the Radisson SAS Royal hotel in Dublin, Ireland. It was a nice looking hotel, although the food was quite poor. I didn’t stay in that hotel, I was in a hotel next to Christ Church Cathedral which was only a few blocks away from the event.

OK, so what were the highlights of the event for you?

Discovering jQuery in one of the first tutorials, a JavaScript library which is perfect for Unobtrusive JavaScript (which means that the JavaScript is only an enhancement to interaction on the page, and the page is still usable if you have JavaScript turned off). I really wish I had more time to play with it. It is, however, just a page manipulation library (although there are plugins available for it)…. I suggest that you check out OpenLink AJAX Toolkit (OAT) if you want eye-candy as well as page manipulation, it would be interesting to compare OAT and jQuery one day in terms of feature set and compatibility with browsers…. although theres nothing stopping you from using them with each other.

Simon Wardley talked about “why open matters“, he had hundreds of slides which he managed to get through in time. It was the best presentation that I have ever seen.

Hearing from Rattle Research about their work with the BBC to provide contextually relevant content, and doing so by using information provided by DBpedia and other Linked Data Sources. This was in their presentation “Using socially authored content to provide new routes through existing content archives“.

The “Building the Real Time Web” was great also, it was supposed to be by Blaine Cook but he couldn’t make it to the event so a few people (from Yahoo Brickhouse and Dopplr) made a quick presentation in the form of a discussion. It was a very innovative discussion which talked about APIs and the XMPP/Jabber protocol.

Hearing about the wonderful projects at the BBC where they are building Semantic Web / Linked Data platforms. Two things they are doing are:

• Putting all of their TV and Radio programme information on the Linked Data Web.
• Using the programme information, some clever attention profiling and coupling that with XMPP to send you messages of programmes which you might like a certain period of time before they start.

The UK Government also have some interesting Semantic Web based platforms that they are building, including turning the London Gazette into an RDFa based site.

And finally Uldis did a great job talking about how FOAF and SIOC fit into DataPortability ideals, which I mentioned briefly in my talk also.

How did your talk go?

It went well, I had a few questions and comments after. My talk “Linked Data Deployment” was chaired by Brian Suda of TM Software and Microformats.org…. which was interesting because my talk was essentially on how to exploit HTTP procedures like Content Negotiation and URL Rewriting to provide Linked Data… which clears up network mess of providing huge documents of HTML with RDFa or Microformats because you can provide HTML and RDF at the same location and provide it depending on the requested MIME-Type.

I think it went well, even though I was incredibly nervous because of this being my attendance and talk at a real conference, and the first time I had been to Ireland, and the first time I had been on a plane without anybody else that I had known… so the whole event was a completely new situation for me!

Did you meet any interesting people?

Of course. Just to name a few:

• Ian Forrester is one of the nicest guys I’ve ever met, he is from BBC Backstage.
• Patrick and a few of the other guys in the various technology depts at the BBC.
• Richard from lastminute.com labs
• Uldis Boj?rs from DERI
• Aral Balkan
• Brian Matthews of e-Science at STFC (who also guest lectures at my old university: Oxford Brookes University)
• Simon Wardley

Also saw a few people I have met before, including Dave Beckett, Andrew Walkinshaw, Keith Alexander and Ian Davis.

And the event overall?

Was very much a success, lots of interesting topics and it certainly got people talking about possibilities. I would definitely consider going again in the future.

How about Dublin?

I managed to get the change to look around Christ Church Cathedral in Dublin, which is incredibly beautiful (I took some pictures of the cathedral).

If you ever go to Dublin, then I highly recommend that you go visit the ISKON restaurant called Govindas, very good vegetarian food all set out in a canteen style, not too expensive either. I also went to another vegetarian restaurant in Dublin called Juice, that was very good and a little ‘posher’ than Govindas. Other than that, it was quite hard to find vegetarian food in Dublin.

I had a good look around the Temple Bar area, which I consider to be the student central. Its effectively the oldest part of the city.

It’s a lovely city, and I’d love to visit Dublin again…. maybe as a holiday instead of on business.

I’ve been nominated for the ComputerWeekly.com IT Blog Awards 2008 in the Programming and Development category.

Each candidate gets a nomination point for each person that nominates his/her blog. So add your nomination by sending an email with, the subject “development-blog” and my blogs address as the content. Like so:

To: [email protected]

Subject: development-blog

Content: https://www.vanirsystems.com/danielsblog
The nomination points system closes on the 31st May 2008, and then it’s up to the judges to work out whether my blog is worthy enough for the award. I certainly hope it is, theres lots of good content in this blog :p

OK, so I’ve fully moved in now to my flat in Bristol (well, there are a few things still to unpack and to sort out…. but everything is now in the new flat). I had a few problems getting the Internet sorted quickly, but I have just received my shiny new cable modem.

Over the past week I’ve been training myself up on the internals of Virtuoso, in particular RDF Views and ODBC-based hosting. I’ve got a lot of things to add to my “Universe of Discourse”, and you’ll see them in due course (most likely in the form of blog posts). You’ll also see a report on my experience at XTech 2008 soon, which happened earlier in the month. I’ve also got a bit of catching up in terms of latest announcements on the Semantic Web / Linked Data front.

In the meantime I was asked by Pete Cooper to take some pictures of my bookshelves. He asked a while ago, but I thought I’d wait until I moved, so that things could be a bit clearer and more sorted. So, the long awaited bookshelf pictures are available via flickr.

I think I am going to enjoy living here, its a great location and I’ve got loads more room here than I did in my old place. Lots of things to look forward to also.

You’ll hear from me again soon.

Daniel

reverting back to cutline until i fix straightwalker