Semantic Web: Explanation

The semantic web

“I have a dream for the Web [in which computers] become capable of analyzing all the data on the Web – the content, links, and transactions between people and computers.

A ‘Semantic Web’, which should make this possible, has yet to emerge, but when it does, the day-to-day mechanisms of trade, bureaucracy and our daily lives will be handled by machines talking to machines.

The ‘intelligent agents’ people have touted for ages will finally materialize.”

Sir Tim Berners-Lee, inventor of the World Wide Web 1999

Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Semantic_Web

The semantic web

Mostly flat information

Some databases but content very functional

Little engagement or

interactivity

The semantic web

Greater interactivity

Growth of social media /

social networking

Online communities

created / social capital

The semantic web

Joining up of information

Data portability

Browsers and search

engines become more

‘intelligent’

The semantic web

Works but is clunky, not that efficient, technically limited

The semantic web

Smoother experience, looks better, still lacks cohesion

The semantic web

Greater scope for exploration, limitless potential, smart

The semantic web

The semantic web

OK, so we’ve seen how the web is evolving.

Let’s get into semantics.

Firstly, we’ll look at the traditional web model…

The semantic web

Let’s introduce Professor

Gibson.

With the traditional web

model she has the

following…

The semantic web

A faculty page

The semantic web

A faculty page

A research page

The semantic web

A faculty page

A research page

A blog

The semantic web

A faculty page

A research page

A blog

and a staff listing page

The semantic web

The content of these

sites is fine but there are

no linkages between the

data.

So visitors find it

difficult to get all the

information they need

quickly and easily.

The semantic web

That’s where the

Semantic web comes in…

The semantic web

Using code we can create

relationships between

websites, people and

events…

These can then be

understood by the browser

and interpreted in a helpful

way.

The semantic web

So we can link Professor

Gibson’s faculty page to

her research.

The semantic web

So we can link Professor

Gibson’s faculty page to

her research.

Then link data in her blog

to both of these.

The semantic web

So we can link Professor

Gibson’s faculty page to

her research.

Then link data in her blog

to both of these.

And link profile data to

her staff listing.

The semantic web

And her staff listing could

show some of the other

academics she works with.

The semantic web

And her staff listing could

show some of the other

academics she works with.

With her research page

showing her links with

worldwide research

collaborators.

The semantic web

Who also know one of

her colleagues.

The semantic web

Who also know one of

her colleagues.

Who comment on

Professor Gibson’s blog

regularly.

The semantic web

With all this data being

able to be displayed

simply it provides a much

richer user experience and

offers information that

previously might not have

been exposed.

The semantic web

Well that’s exciting stuff. But how do we go about

getting onboard with semantics?

Glad you asked. There are a few different ways we’ll

look at in more detail now…

The semantic web

Firstly we could create

Our documents using

RDF:

ResourceDescriptionFramework

The semantic web

Here special meta-data

code is added to pages

that describe the

relationships between

that data.

These are called triples.

The semantic web

RDF is very powerful but

up to now hasn’t been

widely deployed as it

can be a very complex

process to create the

relationships and

browser support has been

limited.

The semantic web

Having said this, better

tools now exist to

create RDF documents

which we will explore in

the next section.

The semantic web

An easier way of getting

involved is to use

Microformats.

These are simple pieces

of code that allow the

browser to interpret the

data intelligently.

The semantic web

Here’s a couple of real

world examples from

some of our pages…

The semantic web

On the communications

team website the address

Has been coded as a

microformat.

The semantic web

On the communications

team website the address

has been coded as a

microformat.

The semantic web

On the communications

team website the address

has been coded as a

microformat.

This allows the visitor to

automatically add the

contact details to Outlook.

The semantic web

On the communications

team website the address

has been coded as a

microformat.

This allows the visitor to

automatically add the

contact details to Outlook.

The semantic web

Now let’s take a look at

the HR contacts page.

Again we’ve used the

address microformat.

The semantic web

Now let’s take a look at

the HR contacts page.

Again we’ve used the

address microformat.

This allows visitors to get

a Google map of the

location with a single click.

The semantic web

Now let’s take a look at

the HR contacts page.

Again we’ve used the

address microformat.

This allows visitors to get

a Google map of the

location with a single click.