Copyright 2009 Digital Enterprise Research Institute. All rights reserved.
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Opportunities and Challenges for
using Semantic Technologies
Stefan Decker
Digital Enterprise Research Institute www.deri.ie
Digital Enterprise Research Institute www.deri.ie
A Network of Data
and Knowledge
Interconnected
Universal
All encompassing
assists humans, organisations and systems with problem solving
enabling innovation and increased productivity
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Linked Data: Two Key Ingredients
1. RDF – Graph based Data
Identifies objects (URIs)
Interlink information (Relationships)
2. Vocabularies (Ontologies)
provide shared understanding of a domain
organise knowledge in a machine-comprehensible way
give an exploitable meaning to the data
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Why Graphs and Ontologies?
Linked Data!
Cities:Dublin
84421km2
Geo:IslandOfIreland
EU:RepublicOfIreland
Geo:locatedOn
Geo:area Geo:hasCapital
Geo:hasLargestCity
Wikipedia.org
Gov.ie
EU:RepublicOfIreland
Person:BrianCowen
Gov:hasTaoiseach Gov:hasDepartment
IE:DepartmentOfFinance
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Linked Open Data cloud - domains
Over 200 open data sets with more than 25 billion facts,
interlinked by 400 million typed links, doubling every 10 month!
http://lod-cloud.net/
Linking Open Data cloud diagram, by Richard Cyganiak and Anja Jentzsch.
Media
Government
Geo
Publications
User-generated
Life sciences
Cross-domain
US government
UK government
BBC
New York Times
LinkedGeoData
6
BestBuy
Overstock.com
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Network Effects
Digital Enterprise Research Institute www.deri.ie Which school is the
best for our child?
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Where should
we locate the
new factory?
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Where did our money go?
TARP Funds
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Where do I place…
A new hospital?
A new school?
A new shop?
A new distribution
centre?
A new factory?
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Effects….
Reuse of the data, new business opportunities.
Increase the citizen engagement and participation
Improve eGovernment effectiveness and Interoperation:
direct access, cut costs
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Open Data vs. Linkable Data
Linkable, Open Data!
Open Data
Equal access for all
Licensing, legal issues
Transparency
Changing the way
government works
Linkable Data
Easy to Integrate
Standards complient
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http://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/LinkedData.html
Tim Berners-Lee
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education development transportation
decision based on facts!
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Examples from around the world …
Country Official? Rating Datasets
Sweden N ★★ few
New Zealand Y ★★ many
Ireland Y ★★★ few
Canada Y ★★★ many
United States Y* ★★★★ many
Spain N ★★★★★ few
United Kingdom Y ★★★★★ many*
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Government data catalogs
http://datos.fundacionctic.org/sandbox/catalog/map
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Development 2006 - now
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data.gov.uk
http://data.gov.uk/
Provides guidance for all UK
governmental agencies how to
publish with Linked Data
Lists datasets and applications
for developers and end-customers
We’re active in supporting this
effort
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Linked Governmental Data in use …
UK Public Sector Information Data Mashup
http://map.psi.enakting.org/
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Linked Governmental Data in use …
Research Funding Explorer
http://bis.clients.talis.com/
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Linked Governmental Data in use …
Comparing US and UK Global Foreign Aid http://data-gov.tw.rpi.edu/demo/linked/aidviz-1554-10030.html
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Linked Governmental Data in use …
Crime statistics http://www.jenitennison.com/visualisation/crime.html
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Ireland: Fingal Open Data
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Italy: Tentino Open Data
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LATC:EC Governmental Datasets
http://latc-project.eu/
Will focus on three domains: business-related data,
legal data, and data about European institutions
Publish 20 datasets produced by European
institutions with an expected volume of over 10 billion
triples and 100 million links, such as:
Eurostat
CORDIS
European Job Mobility Portal
Euro-LEX
…
“To create an in-depth test-bed for data intensive
applications concerning EC governmental data.”
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driving Web standards
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Standardisation
eGovernment Interest Group (eGov IG)
http://www.w3.org/2007/eGov/IG/
“The mission of the eGov IG is to explore how to improve
access to government through better use of the Web and
achieve better government transparency using open Web
standards at any government level (local, state, national
and multi-national)”
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Standardisation
Projects http://www.w3.org/egov/wiki/Projects
Outreach
Demonstration
Best Practices for Using Web Technologies to Deliver
Government Services
Best Practices for Government Data Management
Best Practices for Government Use of Social Media
Data Catalog Vocabulary task force
http://www.w3.org/egov/wiki/Data_Catalog_Vocabulary
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You’re sitting on a treasure chest … http://w
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