The next generation of the web, the Semantic Web, integrates distributed web resources from various domains by allowing data (instantial and ontological data) to be shared and reused across applications, enterprise and community boundaries based on the Resource Description Framework (RDF). Nevertheless, the RDF was not developed for casual users who are unfamiliar with the RDF but interested in data represented using RDF. NLG may be a possible solution to bridging the gap between the casual users and RDF data, but the cost of separately applying fine grained NLG techniques for every domain in the Semantic Web would be extremely high, and hence not realistic.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Aberdeen University, 2008. / Title from web page (viewed on Mar. 23, 2009). Includes bibliographical references.

This mixed-method study explored cataloger’s judgment through the presence of text as entered by catalogers for the 11 electronic resource items during the National Libraries test for Resource Description and Access (RDA). Although the literature discusses cataloger’s judgment and suggests that cataloging practice based on new cataloging code RDA will more heavily rely on cataloger’s judgment, the topic of cataloger’s judgment in RDA cataloging was not formally studied. The purpose of this study was to study the differences and similarities in the MARC records created as a part of the RDA National Test and to determine if the theory of bounded rationality could explain cataloger’s judgment based on the constructs of cognitive and temporal limits. This goal was addressed through a content analysis of the MARC records and various statistical tests (Pearson’s Chi-square, Fisher’s Exact, and Cramer’s V). Analysis of 217 MARC records was performed on seven elements of the bibliographic record. This study found that there were both similarities and differences among the various groups of participants, and there are indications that both support and refute the assertion that catalogers make decisions based on the constructs of time and cognitive ability. Future research is needed to be able to determine if bounded rationality is able to explain cataloger’s judgment; however, there are indicators that both support and refute this assertion. The findings from this research have implications for the cataloging community through the provision of training opportunities for catalogers, evaluating workflows, ensuring the proper indexing of bibliographic records for discovery, and recommended edits to RDA.

AGUIA é uma aplicação web front-end, desenvolvida para gerenciar dados clínicos, demográficos e biomoleculares de pacientes coletados durante os ensaios clínicos gastrointestinais no MD Anderson Cancer Center. A diversidade de metodologias envolvidas na triagem de pacientes e no processamento da amostra traz uma heterogeneidade dos tipos de dados correspondentes. Sendo assim, estes devem ser baseados em uma arquitetura orientada a recurso que transforma dados heterogêneos em dados semânticos, mais especificamente em RDF (Resource Description Framework - Estrutura para a descrição de recursos). O banco de dados escolhido foi o S3DB, por este ter cumprido os requisitos necessários de transformação dos dados heterogêneos de diferentes fontes em RDF, distinguindo explicitamente a descrição do domínio e sua instanciação, permitindo simultaneamente a contínua edição de ambos. Além disso, ele usa um protocolo REST, e é de código aberto e domínio público o que facilita o desenvolvimento e divulgação. Contudo, por mais abrangente e flexível, um formato de web semântica pode por si só, não abordar a questão de representar o conteúdo de uma forma que faça sentido para especialistas do domínio. Assim, o objetivo do trabalho aqui descrito foi identificar um conjunto adicional de descritores que forneceu as especificações para a interface gráfica do usuário. Esse objetivo foi perseguido através da identificação de um formalismo que faz uso do esquema RDF para permitir a montagem automática de interfaces gráficas de uma forma significativa. Um modelo RDF generalizado foi, portanto, definido de tal forma que as mudanças nos descritores gráficos sejam automaticamente e imediatamente refletidas na configuração da aplicação web do cliente, que também está disponível neste trabalho. Embora os padrões de design identificados reflitam e beneficiem os requisitos específicos de interagir com os dados gerados pelos ensaios clínicos, a expectativa é que eles contenham pistas para uma solução de propósito geral. Em particular, sugere-se que os padrões mais úteis identificados pelos utilizadores deste sistema sejam suscetíveis de serem reutilizáveis para outras fontes de dados, ou pelo menos para outros bancos de dados semânticos de ensaios clínicos. / AGUIA is a web application front-end originally developed to manage clinical, demographic and biomolecular patient data collected during gastrointestinal clinical trials at MD Anderson Cancer Center. The diversity of methodologies involved in patient screening and sample processing, brings corresponding heterogeneity of data types. Thus, this data must be based on a Resource Oriented Architecture that transforms heterogeneous data in semantic data, most specifically in RDF (Resource Description Framework). The database chosen was a S3DB, because it met the necessary requirements of transforming heterogeneous data from different sources in RDF, explicitly distinguishing the description of the domain from its instantiation, while allowing for continuous editing of both. Furthermore, it uses a REST protocol, and is open source and in the public domain which facilitates development and dissemination. Nevertheless, comprehensive and flexible a semantic web format may be, it does not by itself address the issue of representing content in a form that makes sense for domain experts. Accordingly, the goal of the work described here was to identify an additional set of descriptors that provide specifications for the graphic user interface. That goal was pursued by identifying a formalism that makes use of the RDF schema to enable automatic assembly of graphic user interfaces in a meaningful manner. A generalized RDF model was therefore defined such that changes in the graphic descriptors are automatically and immediately reflected into the configuration of the client web browser interface application, which is also made available with this report. Although the design patterns identified reflect, and benefit, from the specific requirements of interacting with data generated by clinical trials, the expectation is that they contain clues for a general purpose solution. In particular, it is suggested that the most useful patterns identified by the users of this system are susceptible to being reusable for other data sources, or at least for other clinical trial semantic web data stores.

The Semantic Web, or the Web of Data, promotes common data formats for representing structured data and their links over the web. RDF is the defacto standard for semantic data where it provides a flexible semi-structured model for describing concepts and relationships. RDF datasets consist of entries (i.e, triples) that range from thousands to Billions. The astronomical growth of RDF data calls for scalable RDF management and query processing strategies. This dissertation addresses efficient query processing over web-scale RDF data. The first contribution is WORQ, an online, workload-driven, RDF query processing technique. Based on the query workload, reduced sets of intermediate results (or reductions, for short) that are common for specific join pattern(s) are computed in an online fashion. Also, we introduce an efficient solution for RDF queries with unbound properties. The second contribution is SPARTI, a scalable technique for computing the reductions offline. SPARTI utilizes a partitioning schema, termed SemVP, that enables efficient management of the reductions. SPARTI uses a budgeting mechanism with a cost model to determine the worthiness of partitioning. The third contribution is KC, an efficient RDF data management system for the cloud. KC uses generalized filtering that encompasses both exact and approximate set membership structures that are used for filtering irrelevant data. KC defines a set of common operations and introduces an efficient method for managing and constructing filters. The final contribution is semantic filtering where data can be reduced based on the spatial, temporal, or ontological aspects of a query. We present a set of encoding techniques and demonstrate how to use semantic filters to reduce irrelevant data in a distributed setting.

The new cataloging code Resource Description and Access (RDA) provides a system of instructions for recording relationships between related resources by means of a controlled vocabulary of relationship designators. The purpose of this two years master’s thesis in Archive, Library and Museum studies is to examine the construction of this system, as well as its theoretical foundation. One theoretical point of departure is the necessity of operational definitions for consistent identification of bibliographic relationships. Another such point of departure is that the theoretical model on which RDA is based (the FRBR model) is not a complete description of the biblio­graphic universe, but merely a limited representation of a set of assumptions about that universe. The thesis first examines Barbara B. Tillett's and Richard P. Smiraglia's theories and taxonomies of bibliographic relationships. The analysis shows that, in spite of their claims to provide a theoretical basis for consistent treatment of bibliographic relationships, neither Tillett nor Smiraglia offers operationally applicable definitions. The thesis then turns to RDA in order to examine the instructions and the list of relationship designators. After an introductory survey of RDA chapters 24 to 28, the possibility to record relationship designators at different entity levels is discussed. Remarkably, RDA neither provides instructions for how to choose between the entity levels, nor does it point out what this choice signifies. Finally, a selection of relationship designators representing content relationships is examined. The selected designators are analysed and compared to corresponding categories in literary theorist Gérard Genette's attempt to classify intertextual relationships. The analysis shows that though some of the selected designators are satisfactorily operationalized, most are not.

The Resource Description Framework (RDF) is the logical data model of the Semantic Web. RDF encodes information as a directed graph using a set of labeled edges known formally as resource-property-value statements or, in common usage, as RDF triples or simply triples. Values recorded in RDF triple form are either Universal Resource Identifiers (URIs) or literals. The use of URIs allows links between distributed data sources, which enables a logical model of data as a graph spanning the Internet. SPARQL is a standard SQL-like query language on RDF triples. This report describes the translation of SPARQL queries to equivalent SQL queries operating on a relational representation of RDF triples, and the physical optimization of that representation using the IBM DB2 relational database management system. Performance was evaluated using the Berlin SPARQL Benchmark. The results show that the implementation can perform well on certain queries, but more work is required to improved overall performance and scalability. / text

In this paper, the author presents his current research topic, objectives of research as well as research questions. The paper motivates the integration of implicit background knowledge in data mining and optimization techniques based on semantic web knowledge bases. Furthermore, it outlines work of related research areas and states the research methodology

Made available in DSpace on 2014-06-11T19:26:45Z (GMT). No. of bitstreams: 0 Previous issue date: 2008-02-06Bitstream added on 2014-06-13T18:55:06Z : No. of bitstreams: 1 correa_rmr_me_mar.pdf: 280516 bytes, checksum: 216222ad82d3401a2b10e3a13169b6a9 (MD5) / Universidade Estadual Paulista (UNESP) / A informação é essencial neste limiar do Século XXI, assim como sua transmissão. A catalogação descritiva, como área da Biblioteconomia responsável por transmitir as informações contidas em acervos de qualquer natureza, por meio da construção de formas de representação, deve acompanhar a evolução das necessidades dos usuários. Esta constatação preocupa especialistas da área. A padronização, na representação das informações e documentos é imprescindível e também o objeto de trabalho da catalogação descritiva como forma de garantia do intercâmbio de registros bibliográficos. A preocupação cresce com a rapidez com que as informações são geradas e disponibilizadas em diferentes formas. Este trabalho propõe-se a analisar o estado da arte do esquema Resource Description and Access (RDA) elaborado pela International Federation of Libraries Associations (IFLA), para uso de catalogadores e bases de dados bibliográficos. A análise baseia-se em pesquisas bibliográficas on-line. A evolução da catalogação e seus códigos de regras; a influência das tecnologias nos meios de comunicação, especificamente na troca de informações bibliográficas; a compatibilidade de conceitos visando a comunicação eficiente entre máquina, catalogador e informações codificadas para atendimento dos usuários foram utilizadas para a construção da parte histórica do trabalho. O estudo do RDA foi elaborado reunindo-se as necessidades informacionais, a catalogação descritiva e o novo esquema para compreender sua abrangência e a sua possível aceitação internacional, como uma forma de possibilitar o controle bibliográfico e ampliar o acesso e uso das informações disponíveis nos mais diversos ambientes informacionais. O RDA, por ser um esquema em fase de elaboração somente pode ser analisado do ponto de vista teórico. Nossa análise verificou que o RDA é um esquema eficaz, por aliar a teoria à prática. / Information and its transmission are essentials at the threshold of the XXI century Descriptive cataloging being an area of the Library Science is responsible for transmitting information existing inside of holdings of all types. This is made by building forms of representation and must follow the evolution of the needs of users. This affirmation worries specialists of the area. Standardization is indispensable in the representation of information and documents and it is also the aim of descriptive cataloging work; it is a grant for the exchange of bibliographic records. The worry increases as fast as the creation of new information available in different forms. The goal of this work is to analyze the state-of-the art of the standard “Resource Description and Access (RDA)” developed by the International Federation of Libraries Associations (IFLA) for catalogers and workers in bibliographic database. This work is founded in on-line bibliographic researches. The building of the historic of this work was based in the following factors: evolution of cataloging and its codes of rules; influence of technology in the communication media specifically in the exchange of bibliographic information; compatibility of concepts to reach an efficient communication between machine, cataloger and coded information to attend the user. This study of RDA was elaborated getting together the informational needs, the descriptive cataloging and the new standard, in order to understand its scope and if it is possible the international acceptance of it, as a form of bibliographic control as well as a way to enlarge the access and use of information available in the most different informational environments. Since RDA is a standard that is being developed, it may only be studied at the theoretical point of view. We verified that RDA is an effective standard since it links theory and practice.

AGUIA é uma aplicação web front-end, desenvolvida para gerenciar dados clínicos, demográficos e biomoleculares de pacientes coletados durante os ensaios clínicos gastrointestinais no MD Anderson Cancer Center. A diversidade de metodologias envolvidas na triagem de pacientes e no processamento da amostra traz uma heterogeneidade dos tipos de dados correspondentes. Sendo assim, estes devem ser baseados em uma arquitetura orientada a recurso que transforma dados heterogêneos em dados semânticos, mais especificamente em RDF (Resource Description Framework - Estrutura para a descrição de recursos). O banco de dados escolhido foi o S3DB, por este ter cumprido os requisitos necessários de transformação dos dados heterogêneos de diferentes fontes em RDF, distinguindo explicitamente a descrição do domínio e sua instanciação, permitindo simultaneamente a contínua edição de ambos. Além disso, ele usa um protocolo REST, e é de código aberto e domínio público o que facilita o desenvolvimento e divulgação. Contudo, por mais abrangente e flexível, um formato de web semântica pode por si só, não abordar a questão de representar o conteúdo de uma forma que faça sentido para especialistas do domínio. Assim, o objetivo do trabalho aqui descrito foi identificar um conjunto adicional de descritores que forneceu as especificações para a interface gráfica do usuário. Esse objetivo foi perseguido através da identificação de um formalismo que faz uso do esquema RDF para permitir a montagem automática de interfaces gráficas de uma forma significativa. Um modelo RDF generalizado foi, portanto, definido de tal forma que as mudanças nos descritores gráficos sejam automaticamente e imediatamente refletidas na configuração da aplicação web do cliente, que também está disponível neste trabalho. Embora os padrões de design identificados reflitam e beneficiem os requisitos específicos de interagir com os dados gerados pelos ensaios clínicos, a expectativa é que eles contenham pistas para uma solução de propósito geral. Em particular, sugere-se que os padrões mais úteis identificados pelos utilizadores deste sistema sejam suscetíveis de serem reutilizáveis para outras fontes de dados, ou pelo menos para outros bancos de dados semânticos de ensaios clínicos. / AGUIA is a web application front-end originally developed to manage clinical, demographic and biomolecular patient data collected during gastrointestinal clinical trials at MD Anderson Cancer Center. The diversity of methodologies involved in patient screening and sample processing, brings corresponding heterogeneity of data types. Thus, this data must be based on a Resource Oriented Architecture that transforms heterogeneous data in semantic data, most specifically in RDF (Resource Description Framework). The database chosen was a S3DB, because it met the necessary requirements of transforming heterogeneous data from different sources in RDF, explicitly distinguishing the description of the domain from its instantiation, while allowing for continuous editing of both. Furthermore, it uses a REST protocol, and is open source and in the public domain which facilitates development and dissemination. Nevertheless, comprehensive and flexible a semantic web format may be, it does not by itself address the issue of representing content in a form that makes sense for domain experts. Accordingly, the goal of the work described here was to identify an additional set of descriptors that provide specifications for the graphic user interface. That goal was pursued by identifying a formalism that makes use of the RDF schema to enable automatic assembly of graphic user interfaces in a meaningful manner. A generalized RDF model was therefore defined such that changes in the graphic descriptors are automatically and immediately reflected into the configuration of the client web browser interface application, which is also made available with this report. Although the design patterns identified reflect, and benefit, from the specific requirements of interacting with data generated by clinical trials, the expectation is that they contain clues for a general purpose solution. In particular, it is suggested that the most useful patterns identified by the users of this system are susceptible to being reusable for other data sources, or at least for other clinical trial semantic web data stores.