Abstract

Providing access to cultural heritage data beyond book digitization and information retrieval projects is important for delivering advanced semantic support to end users, in order to address their specific needs. We introduce a separation of concerns for heritage data management by explicitly defining different user groups and analyzing their particular requirements. Based on this analysis, we developed a comprehensive system architecture for accessing, annotating, and querying textual historic data. Novel features are the deployment of a Wiki user interface, natural language processing services for end users, metadata generation in OWL ontology format, SPARQL queries on textual data, and the integration of external clients through Web Services. We illustrate these ideas with the management of a historic encyclopedia of architecture.

Description

The Semantic Web vision is considered the next generation of the Web that enables sharing data, resources and knowledge between parties that belong to different organizations, different cultures, and/or different communities. Ontologies and rules play the main role in the Semantic Web for publishing community vocabularies and policies, for annotating resources and for turning Web applications into inference-enabled collaboration platforms. After a short introduction into the basic concepts, standards, and tools of the Semantic Web, we present how today's Semantic Web tools, languages, and techniques can be used in various application. We first start from the use of the Semantic Web technologies for providing online educators with feedback about how their students use online courses in learning management systems. Next, we demonstrate the use of the Semantic Web technologies and text mining techniques to improve software development process and software maintenance. Finally, we explain the use of the Semantic Web technologies in multimedia-enhanced applications.

Introduction

The FungalWeb Ontology is a knowledge representation vehicle designed to integrate information relevant to industrial applications of enzymes. The ontology integrates information from established sources and supports complex queries to the instantiated FungalWeb knowledge base. The ontology represents prototype Semantic Web technology customized to the domain of industrial enzymes with a focus on enzyme discovery, commercial enzyme products and vendors, and the industrial applications and benefits of industrial enzymes. Using a series of application scenarios we demonstrate the utility of this 'Semantic Web' infrastructure to the enzyme biotechnologist.

Abstract

Text Mining in biology and biomedicine requires a large amount of domain-specific knowledge. Publicly accessible resources hold much of the information needed, yet their practical integration into natural language processing (NLP) systems is fraught with manifold hurdles, especially the problem of semantic disconnectedness throughout the various resources and components. Ontologies can provide the necessary framework for a consistent semantic integration, while additionally delivering formal reasoning capabilities to NLP.

In this chapter, we address four important aspects relating to the integration of ontology and NLP: (i) An analysis of the different integration alternatives and their respective vantages; (ii) The design requirements for an ontology supporting NLP tasks; (iii) Creation and initialization of an ontology using publicly available tools and databases; and (iv) The connection of common NLP tasks with an ontology, including technical aspects of ontology deployment in a text mining framework. A concrete application example—text mining of enzyme mutations—is provided to motivate and illustrate these points.

Keywords: Text Mining, NLP, Ontology Design, Ontology Population, Ontological NLP

Abstract

We present a system capable of modeling human newspaper readers. It is based on the extraction of reported speech, which is subsequently converted into a fuzzy theory-based representation of single statements. A domain analysis then assigns statements to topics. A number of fuzzy set operators, including fuzzy belief revision, are applied to model different belief strategies. At the end, our system holds certain beliefs while rejecting others.

Abstract

Software maintainers routinely have to deal with a multitude of artifacts, like source code or documents, which often end up disconnected, due to their different representations and the size and complexity of legacy systems. One of the main challenges in software maintenance is to establish and maintain the semantic connections among all the different artifacts. In this paper, we show how Semantic Web technologies can deliver a unified representation to explore, query and reason about a multitude of software artifacts. A novel feature is the automatic integration of two important types of software maintenance artifacts, source code and documents, by populating their corresponding sub-ontologies through code analysis and text mining. We demonstrate how the resulting "Software Semantic Web" can support typical maintenance tasks through ontology queries and DL reasoning, such as security analysis, architectural evolution, and traceability recovery between code and documents.

Keywords: Software Maintenance, Ontology Population, Text Mining.

Abstract

The growing number of publicly available information sources makes it impossible for individuals to keep track of all the various opinions on one topic. The goal of our artificial believer system presented in this paper is to extract and analyze statements of opinion from newspaper articles.

Beliefs are modeled using a fuzzy-theoretic approach applied after NLP-based information extraction. A fuzzy believer models a human agent, deciding what statements to believe or reject based on different, configurable strategies.

Abstract

We investigate the integration of Wiki systems with automated natural language processing (NLP) techniques. The vision is that of a "self-aware" Wiki system reading, understanding, transforming, and writing its own content, as well as supporting its users in information analysis and content development. We provide a number of practical application examples, including index generation, question answering, and automatic summarization, which demonstrate the practicability and usefulness of this idea. A system architecture providing the integration is presented, as well as first results from an initial implementation based on the GATE framework for NLP and the MediaWiki system.

General Terms: Design, Human Factors, Languages
Keywords: Self-aware Wiki System, Wiki/NLP Integration

Abstract

The different stages in the life-cycle of content—creation, storage, retrieval, and analysis—are usually regarded as distinct and isolated steps. In this paper we examine the synergies resulting from their integration within a single architecture.

Our goal is to employ such an architecture to improve user support for knowledge-intensive tasks. We present a case study from the area of building architecture, which is currently ongoing.

Abstract

We analyse the requirements for an advanced semantic support of users—building historians and architects—of a multi-volume encyclopedia of architecture from the late 19th century. Novel requirements include the integration of content retrieval, content development, and automated content analysis based on natural language processing.

We present a system architecture for the detected requirements and its current implementation. A complex scenario demonstrates how a desktop supporting semantic analysis can contribute to specific, relevant user tasks.