Open World Thinking

transcript

shared innovation™

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Open World Thinking

Nadeem ShabirTechnical Lead

nadeem.shabir@talis.com

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Some questions for you

before we go any further, I want to ask you guys a few questions ... that might help illustrate some of the things im going to talk about ...

What is the most referred to text in first year undergraduate computer science courses in the UK?

Based on pedagogical approaches, what are the recommended resources required to teach an emerging subject in a new department a University somewhere?

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Why can’t we answer these questions?

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is it because the the data doesn’t exist?

Why can’t we answer these questions?

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if the data exists then its within individual institutions

data exists within institutions across a myriad of internal systems

sometimes even across departments

if the data exists then its within individual institutions

Higher Education Institutes are ....

data exists within institutions across a myriad of internal systems

sometimes even across departments

http://www.flickr.com/photos/eirikref/727551264/

... silos ... and as long as institutions remain silo’s we won’t ever be able to answer the kinds of questions I presented earlier.

There’s a real need to start to find ways of linking data together across these silo’s

Silos within silos .. departments within institutions ...

... silos within silos

Image Credit goes here

product of close world thinking

closed world decisions, solve the immediate problem for ourselves.

only interested in the data that we have and control.

in a way we didn’t have any choice ... it was a product of the problems we were trying to solve at the time

structure on the fly vs structure up front

the world has changed and so too has the problem...

Why have we ended up with silos?

the problems we were trying to solve then are different to now

only really interested in the data that we have control over

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“Openness tends to be an inexorable movement through time”

what is open world thinking ...

we’ve seen historically that there is this ‘inexorable movement’ away from

change the way you think about building systems ... win is that when you want to integrate with them its so much easier.

http://www.flickr.com/photos/65193799@N00/515399703/ and

open world thinking is not about technology its about a paradigm shift in our understanding of how we need to solve.

problems and mitigate the ‘political’ risk within institutions.

thinking about how to ensure that the data we design is valuable to someone other than us

it’s not about atechnologychange . . .

it’s about a paradigmshift

“Linked Data is the Semantic Web done right and the Web done right.”Sir Tim Berners-Lee

linked data movement is publishing data in a agreed form

and through openness others can now come along and build new services and applications on that use this data.

design for appropriation ( architecture of assembly ), structure up front vs structure on the fly

so design data at the right level of granularity for reuse - too complex and no one will understand, too vague and you can’t extract meaning from it.

critical mass ... usage stats across the nation in a subject ...you wouldn't have to do any extra when you zoom out of the institute to a consortia or to national level ...

indeed as my friend Rob pointed out so succinctly ... with Open Descriptions and Deferencible URI’s you get interoperability for free

Openness of Description Having an agreed way of describing certain kinds of data is important.

It’s makes it easier to relate things together

Makes it easier to integrate

It makes it easier to share

It’s the only way to realise the dream of the semantic web.

agree on shared ways of describing things

Relate

RelateIntegrate

with Open Descriptions and Dereferencible URI’s you get interoperability for free

Ontologies “a formal representation of a set of concepts within a domain and the relationships between those concepts.”

FOAFSIOC

Hybrid Learning Model picture of Alan Massen’s cards, and explain that whats he’s really doing is going around using an ontology to capture information about pedagogical approaches across institutions.

If you knew what the learning requirements for each course where and the teaching styles that information could be presented to students through applications like Zephyr.

You could also build up a lot of information about the different styles of teaching within an institute, across departments. Or further afield ... you could contrast the different teaching styles for Programming Courses across the UK.

... is an Ontology

would it be useful if we could use an ontology like this to capture teaching styles and learning goals for every course in the Uk?

Ontologies published by Talis

Academic Institutions Internal Structures Ontology

Generic Lifecycle (workflow) Ontology

Resource List Ontology ( sioc, bibo, foaf )

www.vocab.org

... all of which are used to underpin Xiphos

Openness of Access Openness of description homogenises how we agree to represent certain concepts.

It’s becoming increasingly important to be able to allow users to consume content in ways and at times that suit them.

This is necessary to create more personalised learning experiences.

Openness of Access

anywhere

Openness of description homogenises how we agree to represent certain concepts.

This is necessary to create more personalised learning experiences.

Openness of Access

anywhere

This is necessary to create more personalised learning experiences. anytime

Openness of Access

anywhere

anyhow

Openness of Access

anywhere

anyhow

key to personalised learning

Contextualised Perspectives

multiple viewsmultiple contextscontext is closure

Web of Scholarly Data allows us to create contexts on the fly that are relevant for a the task your doing at the time your doing it ... thats the grand vision.

Summary

It’s only by being more open that we can answer the kinds of questions I posed earlier.

Openness is key to being able to rip, mix and burnacross institutional and national boundaries

Summary

Openness is key to being able to rip, mix and burnacross institutional and national boundaries

Summary

Project Xiphos is being engineered from the outset to embrace this ethos . . . to enrich the Web of Scholarly Data

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shared innovationTM

Open World Thinking

Technology