The web of today has evolved into a huge repository of rich Multimedia content for human consumption. The exponential growth of the web made it possible for information size to reach astronomical proportions; far more than a mere human can manage, causing the problem of information overload. Because of this, the creators of the web(lO) spoke of using computer agents in order to process the large amounts of data. To do this, they planned to extend the current web to make it understandable by computer programs. This new web is being referred to as the Semantic Web. Given the huge size of the web, a collective effort is necessary to extend the web. For this to happen, tools easy enough for non-experts to use must be available. This thesis first proposes a methodology which semi-automatically labels semantic entities in web pages. The methodology first requires a user to provide some initial examples. The tool then learns how to reproduce the user's examples and generalises over them by making use of Adaptive Information Extraction (AlE) techniques. When its level of performance is good enough when compared to the user, it then takes over the process and processes the remaining documents autonomously. The second methodology goes a step further and attempts to gather semantically typed information from web pages automatically. It starts from the assumption that semantics are already available all over the web, and by making use of a number of freely available resources (like databases) combined with AlE techniques, it is possible to extract most information automatically. These techniques will certainly not provide all the solutions for the problems brought about with the advent of the Semantic Web. They are intended to provide a step forward towards making the Semantic Web a reality.

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Due to the large amount of research within the area of smart home environments there is an abundance of data being generated with a largely heterogeneous nature, given that it is generated by multiple sources and therefore stored in various formats. Due to the data's subsequent lack of interoperability, difficulties arise when it is being stored, exchanged and then processed; limiting the opportunity for researchers to compare, share and re-use data. The primary focus of this work has been to redesign and extend the homeML format. Over the duration of this research the format has evolved from version 1.0 to version 2.2 and is presented within this thesis as a proposed standard format to support the storage and exchange of data generated both inside and outside a smart home environment. An online application to support the use of homeML has also been presented. Both homeML version 2.2 and the online application were evaluated by eight smart home environment experts, using a questionnaire consisting of both structured and unstructured questions. Overall the results of this evaluation were considered positive in regards to both usefulness and usability. The evolution of homeML subsequently influenced the redesign and extension of two other formats; homeRuleML to support the storage and exchange of decision support rules generated within a smart home environment and homeADL to support the storage and exchange of activities of daily living performed within a smart home environment. Both homeRuleML and homeADL were originally designed to complement the use of homeML. Therefore as part of this research both formats underwent an iterative evaluation process which ensured they continued to complement the use of the latest version of homeML. Both the homeRuleML and homeADL formats were reviewed multiple times resulting in their evolution from version 1.0 to version 2.1 and version 2.0 respectively.

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This thesis examines the strength of Extensible Markup Language (XML) technology and explores the impact of the implementation of XML in three digital library initiatives which are used as case studies by examining in depth their digital library development. In part I, metadata issues are covered and the different kinds of metadata and metadata systems available for use in digital libraries are evaluated. Different models of storing the data and their relationship with XML are evaluated. The role of SGML in the early development of digital libraries is covered. To illustrate data manipulation, the author experiments with a digital library of images and their evaluations which use an XML-aware relational database. This part also concludes content management of both text and non-text which have used XML or may in the future move towards XML. In part II, three case studies are examined and the results of interviews done by the author when visiting them assist in a detailed evaluation of the three examples. The three digital libraries are: the Library of Congress National Digital Library Program (NDLP), the University of Michigan Digital Library Services (DLS) and the Perseus Digital Library (PDL). Each digital library is evaluated in depth taking into account the digitization processes used, the metadata systems they employ and how the metadata are created, and the delivery systems. The HTTP usage statistics of the three case studies are also analyzed. The on-going work required for the maintenance of the digital libraries, managerial aspects relating to staff management, information on users and their usage and organizational aspects are covered and evaluated. The author evaluates in what ways in each of those aspects the use of XML could benefit the digital library's development. The thesis finishes with a number of recommendations that could be taken up by digital libraries to their benefit.

In many areas the eXtensible Mark-up Language (XML) is becoming the standard exchange and data format. More and more applications not only support XML as an exchange format but also use it as their data model or default file format for graphic, text and database (such as spreadsheet) applications. Computer Supported Cooperative Work is an interdisciplinary field of research dealing with group work, cooperation and their supporting information and communication technologies. One part of it is Real-Time Collaborative Editing, which investigates the design of systems which allow several persons to work simultaneously in real-time on the same document, without the risk of inconsistencies. Existing collaborative editing research applications specialize in one or at best, only a small number of document types; for example graphic, text or spreadsheet documents. This research investigates the development of a software framework which allows collaborative editing of any XML document type in real-time. This presents a more versatile solution to the problems of real-time collaborative editing. This research contributes a new software framework model which will assist software engineers in the development of new collaborative XML editing applications. The devised framework is flexible in the sense that it is easily adaptable to different workflow requirements covering concurrency control, awareness mechanisms and optional locking of document parts. Additionally this thesis contributes a new framework integration strategy that enables enhancements of existing single-user editing applications with real-time collaborative editing features without changing their source code.

The eXtensible Markup Language (XML) is fast emerging as the dominant standard for storing, describing and interchanging data among various systems and databases on the intemet. It offers schema such as Document Type Definition (DTD) or XML Schema Definition (XSD) for defining the syntax and structure of XML documents. To enable efficient usage of XML documents in any application in large scale electronic environment, it is necessary to avoid data redundancies and update anomalies. Redundancy and anomalies in XML documents can lead not only to higher data storage cost but also to increased costs for data transfer and data manipulation. To overcome this problem, this thesis proposes to establish a formal framework of XML document schema design. To achieve this aim, we propose a method to improve and simplify XML schema design by incorporating a conceptual model of the DTD with a theory of database normalization. A conceptual diagram, Graph-Document Type Definition (G-DTD) is proposed to describe the structure of XML documents at the schema level. For G- DTD itself, we define a structure which incorporates attributes, simple elements, complex elements, and relationship types among them. Furthermore, semantic constraints are also precisely defined in order to capture semantic meanings among the defined XML objects. In addition, to provide a guideline to a well-designed schema for XML documents, we propose a set of normal forms for G-DTD on the basis of rules proposed by Arenas and Libkin and Lv. et al. The corresponding normalization rules to transform from a G- DTD into a normal form schema are also discussed. A case study is given to illustrate the applicability of the concept. As a result, we found that the new normal forms are more concise and practical, in particular as they allow the user to find an 'optimal' structure of XML elements/attributes at the schema level. To prove that our approach is applicable for the database designer, we develop a prototype of XML document schema design using a Z formal specification language. Finally, using the same case study, this formal specification is tested to check for correctness and consistency of the specification. Thus, this gives a confidence that our prototype can be implemented successfully to generate an automatic XML schema design.

XML technology has emerged during recent years as a popular choice for representing and exchanging semi-structured data on the Web. It integrates seamlessly with web-based applications. If data is stored and represented as XML documents, then it should be possible to query the contents of these documents in order to extract, synthesize and analyze their contents. This thesis for experimental study of Web architecture for data processing is based on semantic mapping of XML Schema. The thesis involves complex methods and tools for specification, algorithmic transformation and online processing of semi-structured data over the Web in XML format with persistent storage into relational databases. The main focus of the research is preserving the structure of original data for data reconciliation during database updates and also to combine different technologies for XML data processing such as storing (SQL), transformation (XSL Processors), presenting (HTML), querying (XQUERY) and transporting (Web services) using a common framework, which is both theoretically and technologically well grounded. The experimental implementation of the discussed architecture requires a Web server (Apache), Java container (Tomcat) and object-relational DBMS (Oracle 9) equipped with Java engine and corresponding libraries for parsing and transformation of XML data (Xerces and Xalan). Furthermore the central idea behind the research is to use a single theoretical model of the data to be processed by the system (XML algebra) controlled by one standard metalanguage specification (XML Schema) for solving a class of problems (generic architecture). The proposed work combines theoretical novelty and technological advancement in the field of Internet computing. This thesis will introduce a generic approach since both our model (XML algebra) and our problem solver (the architecture of the integrated system) are XML Schema- driven. Starting with the XML Schema of the data, we first develop domain-specific XML algebra suitable for data processing of the specific data and then use it for implementing the main offline components of the system for data processing.