IKMEmergent - Recent changes [en]

Workspaces:1:Working Notes

Timdavies — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 11:53:36 GMT

← Older revision		Revision as of 11:53, 8 September 2010
Line 35:		Line 35:

	<pre>		<pre>
		+	@prefix rdf: <http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#> .
		+	@prefix rdfs: <http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#> .
		+	@prefix definitions: <http://younglives.practicalparticipation.co.uk/ontowiki/younglives/defn#> .
		+	@prefix questions: <http://younglives.practicalparticipation.co.uk/ontowiki/younglives/questions/> .
		+	@prefix answers: <http://younglives.practicalparticipation.co.uk/ontowiki/younglives/answers/> .
		+	@prefix younglives: <http://younglives.practicalparticipation.co.uk/ontowiki/younglives/items/> .
		+	@prefix dbpedia: <http://dbpedia.org/resource/> .
		+
		+	<younglives:individual/2>
		+	a younglives:individual ;
		+	definitions:gender <dbpedia:Female> ;
		+	definitions:age "15" ;
		+	questions:ableToSpeakAboutViewsAndFeelingsToParentsOrGuardians <answer:CertainlyTrue> ;
		+	questions:mostlyParentsTreatFairlyWhenDoneWrong <answer:NA> .
		+
		+	<question:ableToSpeakAboutViewsAndFeelingsToParentsOrGuardians>
		+	rdfs:label "You feel able to speak about your views and feelings with your parents/guardians" ;
		+	definitions:relatedQuestions "younglives:questions/mostlyParentsTreatFairlyWhenDoneWrong" ;
		+	definitions:hasAnswer <answer:CertainlyTrue>, <answer:NA>, <answer:NotTrue>, <answer:AnswerRefused> .
		+
		+	<answer:CertainlyTrue> rdfs:label "A little true for you" .
		+
		+	<answer:NA> rdfs:label "NA" .
		+
		+	<answer:NotTrue> rdfs:label "Not true for you" .
		+
		+	<answer:AnswerRefused> rdfs:label "Refused to answer" .

	</pre>		</pre>
		+
		+	The graph below (geneated with [[http://semweb.salzburgresearch.at/apps/rdf-gravity/ RDF Gravity]) gives a visual representation of the RDF statements above. You can see the individual respondent and their demographics to the top-left of the diagram, their question answers towards the middle, and the question to which those answers may belong on the right.
		+
		+	[[File:RDF-Graph-Version1.png]]
		+
		+	'''Questions'''
		+
		+	Is this making the right sort of use of predicates? Should there be a 'blank node' for each question asked which directly links to the question and the value? Or is it ok to relate the individual to their response value using the question as a predicate?
		+
		+	Should answers be related to individuals by virtue of questions, or should we create predicates (such as ableToSpeakAboutViews) and assume the value of these to be inferred by the answer to the question. We then model the responses as more definite 'properties' of individuals as opposed to propositional attitudes held by those individuals.

File:RDF-Graph-Version1.png

Timdavies — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 11:49:02 GMT

uploaded "[[File:RDF-Graph-Version1.png]]" Example of an RDF graph generated with RDF Gravity for the Young Lives linked open data demonstrator.

New page

Workspaces:1:Working Notes

Timdavies — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 11:32:51 GMT

← Older revision		Revision as of 11:32, 8 September 2010
Line 29:		Line 29:
	*Choosing how to represent variables		*Choosing how to represent variables
	*Choosing how to represent questions		*Choosing how to represent questions
		+
		+	== Initial modelling decisions ==
		+
		+	The below gives an example of a very rough-and-ready attempt to model a question from a Young Lives dataset in RDF:
		+
		+	<pre>
		+
		+	</pre>

Workspaces:1:Linked Open Data

Timdavies — Wed, 08 Sep 2010 09:43:36 GMT

← Older revision		Revision as of 09:43, 8 September 2010
Line 1:		Line 1:
	== Exploring Linked Open Data ==		== Exploring Linked Open Data ==

-	A demonstrator / pilot project is taking place between September and November 2010 working with data from the [http://www.younglives.org.uk/\|Young Lives] project to explore the issues relating to making this available as linked open data online, and the possibilities to visualise and mash-up this data created by this. A workshop in November will explore the outcomes of the pilot and wider themes related to linked and open data in development information contexts.	+	A demonstrator / pilot project is taking place between September and November 2010 working with data from the [http://www.younglives.org.uk/ Young Lives] project to explore the issues relating to making this available as linked open data online, and the possibilities to visualise and mash-up this data created by this. A workshop in November will explore the outcomes of the pilot and wider themes related to linked and open data in development information contexts.

-	See the [http://dgroups.org/Community.aspx?c=611203fb-bd2e-4d5f-a25c-96b078580f93\|IKM Emergent Linked Data dGroup] for more context and discussion.	+	See the [http://dgroups.org/Community.aspx?c=611203fb-bd2e-4d5f-a25c-96b078580f93 IKM Emergent Linked Data dGroup] for more context and discussion.

	=== Young Lives Demonstrator ===		=== Young Lives Demonstrator ===

Main Page

Mike — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 17:52:31 GMT

← Older revision		Revision as of 17:52, 6 September 2010
(One intermediate revision not shown)
Line 10:		Line 10:

	== What's new ==		== What's new ==
		+
		+	[http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/File:Working_Paper-10-Julian_Jenkins-July2010-final.pdf '''Working Paper No 10''']
		+
		+	‘Things can be other than they are.’ Understanding the limitations of current management thinking and knowledge practice for work in the development sector by Julian Jenkins, July 2010 explores the types of problems which management face working in the development field and the nature of the information needed to address these problems. It also offers some practical examples of ways of developing the information needed.<br> <br>

	'''[http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/Documents#Newsletters Newsletter No. 4]''' <br> The most recent issue of the newsletter, published in July 2010, is now online. The newsletter links to the recent synthesis of IKM, and to ongoing interactions and research. (Tue, 20 Jul 2010)		'''[http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/Documents#Newsletters Newsletter No. 4]''' <br> The most recent issue of the newsletter, published in July 2010, is now online. The newsletter links to the recent synthesis of IKM, and to ongoing interactions and research. (Tue, 20 Jul 2010)

File:1009-semanticikm-v4.pdf

Mike — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 17:48:28 GMT

← Older revision		Revision as of 17:48, 6 September 2010
Line 1:		Line 1:
-	This is a background document to a workshop IKM is organising in November to look at development related implementations of linked data and visualisations of linked data. Apart from looking at current innovation in these areas the workshop will consider their potential implicaitons for development and development information.	+	This is a background document to a workshop IKM is organising in November to look at development related implementations of linked data and visualisations of linked data. Apart from looking at current innovation in these areas the workshop will consider their potential implicaitons for development and development information.
		+	{{Categories
		+	\|Category=Organisational practice, Policy, English, Text, Opinion/ debates piece, IKM Internal Programme Document, Development, Development KM, Development Management, IKM, Information Societies
		+	}}

File:IKM Working Paper-11-Robin Mansell-July2010-final-pdf.pdf

Mike — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 17:46:12 GMT

← Older revision	Revision as of 17:46, 6 September 2010
Line 1:	Line 1:

	+	{{Categories
	+	\|Category=Policy, English, Text, Professional output, Working papers, Development, Development Theory, Information Societies
	+	}}

Documents

Mike — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 17:41:52 GMT

← Older revision		Revision as of 17:41, 6 September 2010
(One intermediate revision not shown)
Line 58:		Line 58:
	*No 10 [http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/File:Working_Paper-10-Julian_Jenkins-July2010-final.pdf ‘Things can be other than they are.’ Understanding the limitations of current management thinking and knowledge practice for work in the development sector] by Julian Jenkins, July 2010		*No 10 [http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/File:Working_Paper-10-Julian_Jenkins-July2010-final.pdf ‘Things can be other than they are.’ Understanding the limitations of current management thinking and knowledge practice for work in the development sector] by Julian Jenkins, July 2010

-	<br>	+	*No 11 [http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/File:IKM_Working_Paper-11-Robin_Mansell-July2010-final-pdf.pdf Power and Interests in Developing Knowledge Societies: Exogenous and Endogenous Discourses in Contention] by Robin Mansell, August 2010
		+
		+	<br> <br>

	== Other papers ==		== Other papers ==
Line 114:		Line 116:
	[http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/File:IKM_Documento_de_Trabajo_8_Resumen_ES.pdf‎ Resumen: La gestión del conocimiento y los conocimientos múltiples: un estudio multicaso en los Países Bajos WP8 Español]		[http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/File:IKM_Documento_de_Trabajo_8_Resumen_ES.pdf‎ Resumen: La gestión del conocimiento y los conocimientos múltiples: un estudio multicaso en los Países Bajos WP8 Español]

-	In addition [http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/File:1002-process_summary-_v2.pdf‎ this] is a summary of work in progress with colleagues from the Bridging the Digital Divide group and from the Information Systems Group at the Judge Business School looking at the tensions between desires for predictability and control as against unpredictability and emergence in development research and development management more generally	+	In addition [http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/File:1002-process_summary-_v2.pdf‎ this] is a summary of continuing work in progress with colleagues from the Bridging the Digital Divide group and from the Information Systems Group at the Judge Business School looking at the tensions between desires for predictability and control as against unpredictability and emergence in development research and development management more generally.  The report of the workshop organised as part of this process in Cambridge in September 2009 is published as [http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/File:Working_Paper_9-CambridgeReport.pdf Working Paper no 9] above<br>

	== Associated Material ==		== Associated Material ==
		+
		+	IKM, with others, is in the process of organising a workshop in  November 2010 to consider applications of linked data concerning development related information and the potential implications of such applications for the development information environment.  A [http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/File:1009-semanticikm-v4.pdf background paper] considers the issues behind this initiative.<br>
		+
		+	IKM has been working with colleagues from the Bridging the Digital Divide group and from the Information Systems Group at the Judge Business School looking at the tensions between desires for predictability and control as against unpredictability and emergence in development research and development management more generally. The report of the workshop organised as part of this process in Cambridge in September 2009 is published as [http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/File:Working_Paper_9-CambridgeReport.pdf Working Paper no 9 a]bove.  This is the [http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/File:1002-process_summary-_v2.pdf summary] of continuing work in this area published in February 2010.<br>

	In November 2009, IKM, jointly with CTA and the University of Namibia hosted a Knowledge for Development in Africa workshop in Windoek. CTA has produced the [http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/File:1003-Knowledge_for_Development_in_Africa_Final_Report.pdf‎ Workshop Report].		In November 2009, IKM, jointly with CTA and the University of Namibia hosted a Knowledge for Development in Africa workshop in Windoek. CTA has produced the [http://wiki.ikmemergent.net/index.php/File:1003-Knowledge_for_Development_in_Africa_Final_Report.pdf‎ Workshop Report].

File:1009-semanticikm-v4.pdf

Mike — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 17:16:11 GMT

uploaded "[[File:1009-semanticikm-v4.pdf]]" This is a background document to a workshop IKM is organising in November to look at development related implementations of linked data and visualisations of linked data. Apart from looking at current innovation in these areas the workshop will consider

New page

Workspaces:1:Working Notes

Timdavies — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 16:10:03 GMT

New page

=  Young Lives Data Demonstrator =

Working with data from the Young Lives project we are aiming to identify:

*How such datasets can be published as linked open data;
*What issues arise in the process of publishing the data;
*What sorts of things become possible once the data is published as linked and open data;

 

== Exploring the data ==

Data from the Young Lives project is [http://www.younglives.org.uk/research-methodology-data/young-lives-data available in SPSS files through the UK Data Archive].

The free and open-source [http://www.r-project.org/ R statistical software] can read SPSS files using the 'foreign' package (alternatively, [http://www.gnu.org/software/pspp/ PSPP] is an open source clone of SPSS). With a young lives data file in the current working directory, the following commands can be used to convert the SPSS file to CSV which is easier to work with in most data conversion processes. 
<pre>> install.packages("foreign")
> library(foreign)
> fulldata<-read.spss("datafile.sav",to.data.frame=T)
> write.csv(fulldata,file="datafile.csv")
</pre>
Once you have a CSV file you can explore the data in spreadsheet software or a tool such as [http://code.google.com/p/freebase-gridworks/ Freebase Gridworks]. Within R the following commands may be useful:
<pre>> describe(fulldata) #Show the questions asked for each variable;
> summary(fulldata) #Show a summary of the available data;

</pre>
Modelling the data as RDF involves:

*Choosing how to represent individuals in the dataset
*Choosing how to represent variables
*Choosing how to represent questions

Workspaces:1:Literature Review

Timdavies — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 13:07:12 GMT

← Older revision		Revision as of 13:07, 6 September 2010
(3 intermediate revisions not shown)
Line 6:		Line 6:

	== Understanding linked and open data ==		== Understanding linked and open data ==
		+
		+	For the purpose of understanding linked and open data, we can [http://practicalparticipation.co.uk/odi/report/2010/2-3-data-and-information/ understand data as information that has been recorded or encoded as discrete facts], generally according to some uniform standard. Organisations and projects generate vast quantities of data in their day-to-day work, from figures entered into spreadsheets or meta-data descriptions of video recordings, through to administrative data such as travel records of staff or operational data on the volume of enquiries relating to a particular project. <br>
		+
		+	This data is often held internally only for use by that organisation, and the way it is recorded makes use of internal labels and standards. For example, the column headings in a spreadsheet might be labels that only really make sense to someone from the same organisation, or the author field in the meta-data for a video recording might allow for free-text to be entered leading to the same video-maker being known by many different labels (e.g. Michael Powell; Mike Powell; Mike Powel; and so-on). Linked data provides a set of conventions for recording data based upon using URIs (Uniform Resource Indicators) as the identifiers for things (and relationships) within a dataset.
		+
		+
		+
		+	*Talk of '''linked data '''
		+	*Talk of '''open data '''
		+
		+
		+
		+	Berners-Lee's [http://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/LinkedData.html Linked Data design principles.]
		+
		+
		+
		+	The '''five stars of open, linked data.'''
		+
		+

	*Definitions;		*Definitions;
Line 11:		Line 30:
	*The current open/linked data eco-system;		*The current open/linked data eco-system;

-	Halb et. al (2008) note that many linked data efforts focus on a 'machine-first' approach to publishing data, offering only machine-readable data and using template-based interlinking algorithms to make large numbers of links between datasets. However, they argue that this approach leads to links with limited "semantic strength", and they prefer an approach of publishing linked data in both human-readable and machine-readable formats, with a Wiki-based approach to allowing human users of dataset to suggest links between the data they are viewing and other datasets.	+	<br>

	== Drivers for linked open data initiatives ==		== Drivers for linked open data initiatives ==

-	*~~Distinguishing~~ PSI movements; ~~open~~ government movements; ~~and~~ computerisation movements.	+	*Open Science
		+
		+	The [http://pantonprinciples.org/faq/ Panton Principles for open science data] do not at present (FAQ, September 2010) apply to social science data, suggesting different principles and norms may be appropriate for opening publishing of social-statistics and qualitative research data.
		+
		+
		+
		+	*PSI movements;
		+	*Open government movements;
		+	*Semantic web computerisation movements.

	<br>		<br>
Line 21:		Line 48:
	== Creating and using linked open data: encoding and interpreting ==		== Creating and using linked open data: encoding and interpreting ==

-	<br>	+	Halb et. al (2008) note that many linked data efforts focus on a 'machine-first' approach to publishing data, offering only machine-readable data and using template-based interlinking algorithms to make large numbers of links between datasets. However, they argue that this approach leads to links with limited "semantic strength", and they prefer an approach of publishing linked data in both human-readable and machine-readable formats, with a Wiki-based approach to allowing human users of dataset to suggest links between the data they are viewing and other datasets.<br><br>

-	Halb et. al (2008; §6) note that modelling can involve interpretation of the dataset only possible after reading the full documentation. As they explain ''"the raw data from Eurostat is sometimes ambiguous and can only be resolved by analysing the corresponding docu- ment. For example the statement time\2007 can stand for the value over a period of time (e.g. entire year) or at the end of the reporting period (e.g. 31 Dec)."''	+	Halb et. al (2008; §6) note that modelling can involve interpretation of the dataset only possible after reading the full documentation. As they explain ''"the raw data from Eurostat is sometimes ambiguous and can only be resolved by analysing the corresponding docu- ment. For example the statement time\2007 can stand for the value over a period of time (e.g. entire year) or at the end of the reporting period (e.g. 31 Dec)."''
		+
		+	== Linked open data eco-systems ==
		+
		+	The [http://richard.cyganiak.de/2007/10/lod/ Linked Open Data (LOD) Cloud diagram] (now generated from [http://www.epsiplus.net/news/news/lod_cloud_now_in_ckan CKAN based on user-submitted details]) attempts to show visually the linked open data sources currently available, along with their interlinkages. The Wikipedia extract 'dbpedia' plays a pivotal role in many interlinking efforts. It has been suggested (Auer et. al. 2007; Bizer et. al. 2009) that dbpedia is a key 'nucleus' for a web of open data - providing a 'bottom up' alternative to top-down schema-setting efforts to build a semantic web. As of March 2010 dbpedia includes extracts in 11 languages with varying numbers of 'abstracts' (short/long descriptions of things) available in each language: English (3,144,000), German (503,000), French (545,000), Polish (430,000), Dutch (392,000), Italian (381,000), Spanish (362,000), Japanese (275,000), Portuguese (367,000), Swedish (213,000), Chinese (179,000). Extracts appear, however, to be predominantly based on the English language version of wikipedia. [http://www.w3.org/TR/wordnet-rdf/ Wordnet] also plays an important role in the extraction of information for Wikipedia and the [http://www.mpi-inf.mpg.de/yago-naga/yago/ Yago knowledge base].
		+
		+	<br>

	== Open data in development ==		== Open data in development ==
Line 32:		Line 65:
	<br>		<br>

-	~~=== Technical Notes ===~~	+	<br>

-	==== ~~Distinctions~~ ====	+	=== Technical Notes ===
-	~~''The following need to be distinguished...''~~	+

-	~~OWL Schema~~	+	==== Distinctions ====

-	~~RDF Schema~~	+	''The following need to be distinguished...''

		+	OWL Schema
		+
		+	RDF Schema
		+
		+	<br>

-	~~=== Bibliography ===~~	+	(Draft) An ontology contains knowledge, whereas a schema describes how knowledge should be recorded and represented.

		+	=== Bibliography ===

	{{Categories		{{Categories
	\|Category=Organisational practice, Policy, English, Text, Bibliography, Working papers, Infomed: Emerging Issues		\|Category=Organisational practice, Policy, English, Text, Bibliography, Working papers, Infomed: Emerging Issues
	}}		}}

Workspaces:1:Modeling Data

Timdavies — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 10:35:58 GMT

Created page with '== Notes on Modelling RDF Data == When modelling any data in RDF a number of decisions need to be made about how to construct the data. '''The way data is modelled will affec…'

New page

== Notes on Modelling RDF Data ==

When modelling any data in RDF a number of decisions need to be made about how to construct the data.

'''The way data is modelled will affect:'''

*How easy it is to query in future;
*?

== Examples ==

=== Eurostat ===

[http://events.linkeddata.org/ldow2008/papers/06-halb-raimond-building-linked-data.pdf Halb et. al (2008)] explore the [http://riese.joanneum.at/ modelling of Eurostat data]. They choose to model the data by: 

*Items being contained within a Dataset; (Dataset items are related to their dataset by [http://www.w3.org/TR/skos-reference/skos.html#narrower skos:narrower], from the widely used [http://www.w3.org/2004/02/skos/ skos] schema/ontology for describing 'Knowledge Organising Systems')
*Items containing a single value;
*Items having 'dimensions' such as the year or geographical areas they apply to; 

They re-use a range of schemas including: 

*Dublin Core (DC) Elements and Terms
*Geonames
*Simple Knowledge Organisation Systems (SKOS)
*Description of a Project (DOAP)
*the event ontology [16]

They contrast their modelling of data to [http://www.rdfabout.com/demo/census/ modelling of US Census Data] which uses complex compound properties such as "population15YearsAndOverWithIncomeIn1999". In this model you would need to find the name of the property "population15YearsAndOverWithIncomeIn1999" to query it - and the computer could not easily work out that this contains multiple facets (with or without income; age; year) that could be navigated. By representing Datasets, items and dimensions separately, Halb et. al's model attempts to be more flexible, and to allow new datasets to be added alongside the existing datasets without upsetting the data structure.  

Links between data items and other online resources can be made in Halb et. al's demonstration using three predicates:

*rdfs:seeAlso
*owl:sameAs
*foaf:topic

Each gives the link a different meaning.
{{Categories}}

Workspaces:1:Literature Review

Timdavies — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 10:35:23 GMT

← Older revision		Revision as of 10:35, 6 September 2010
Line 22:		Line 22:

	<br>		<br>
		+
		+	Halb et. al (2008; §6) note that modelling can involve interpretation of the dataset only possible after reading the full documentation. As they explain ''"the raw data from Eurostat is sometimes ambiguous and can only be resolved by analysing the corresponding docu- ment. For example the statement time\2007 can stand for the value over a period of time (e.g. entire year) or at the end of the reporting period (e.g. 31 Dec)."''

	== Open data in development ==		== Open data in development ==
Line 30:		Line 32:
	<br>		<br>

		+	=== Technical Notes ===
		+
		+	==== Distinctions ====
		+	''The following need to be distinguished...''
		+
		+	OWL Schema
		+
		+	RDF Schema

Workspaces:1:Linked Open Data

Timdavies — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 10:18:49 GMT

← Older revision		Revision as of 10:18, 6 September 2010
Line 7:		Line 7:
	=== Young Lives Demonstrator ===		=== Young Lives Demonstrator ===

-	[[Workspaces:1:Literature Review\|Literature Review]]	+	[[Workspaces:1:Literature Review\|Literature Review]] and [[Workspaces:1:Modeling Data\|Notes on Modelling RDF data]]

	[[Workspaces:1:Working Notes\|Working Notes]]		[[Workspaces:1:Working Notes\|Working Notes]]

Workspaces:1:Literature Review

Timdavies — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 10:15:22 GMT

Understanding linked and open data:

New page

= Brief Literature Review: Linked Open Data   =

This wiki page is a work-in-progress brief literature review looking at [[Workspaces:1:Linked Open Data|Linked Open Data in Development]]. It will be developed over September and October 2010. 

 

== Understanding linked and open data ==

*Definitions;
*Distinctions; 
*The current open/linked data eco-system;

Halb et. al (2008) note that many linked data efforts focus on a 'machine-first' approach to publishing data, offering only machine-readable data and using template-based interlinking algorithms to make large numbers of links between datasets. However, they argue that this approach leads to links with limited "semantic strength", and they prefer an approach of publishing linked data in both human-readable and machine-readable formats, with a Wiki-based approach to allowing human users of dataset to suggest links between the data they are viewing and other datasets.

== Drivers for linked open data initiatives ==

*Distinguishing PSI movements; open government movements; and computerisation movements. 

 

== Creating and using linked open data: encoding and interpreting ==

 

== Open data in development ==

*Mapping existing initiatives and organisations
*IATI; OKF; AidData; Agropedia etc. 

 

=== Bibliography ===

{{Categories
|Category=Organisational practice, Policy, English, Text, Bibliography, Working papers, Infomed: Emerging Issues
}}

Workspaces:1:Semantic IKM Background Paper

Timdavies — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 08:48:45 GMT

New page

A discussion paper originally posted to the [http://dgroups.org/ViewDiscussion.aspx?c=611203fb-bd2e-4d5f-a25c-96b078580f93&i=15a21c57-8dfb-449f-9435-d8fd77c56317|Related dGroup] by Mike Powell. Back to [[Workspaces:1:Linked_Open_Data]]

= Semantic IKM?  =

Context and possible directions for IKM’s engagement with emerging web technologies. Background Paper – version 3

== '''Introduction''' ==

At a recent e-diplomacy workshop,organised by the Diplo Foundation , I gave a brief talk on the potential of linked data to affect the information environment in which diplomats work. Although the subject was on the edge of the agenda of what was quite a hands on, practical event, several people in the audience, particularly those from smaller or less influential countries, immediately grasped the potential impact of new practices of data organisation on the politics of information sharing – on openness, inclusivity and exclusivity – in positive, negative and unforeseen ways.

The paper itself was a result of a visit by Pete Cranston, Dejan Dincic and myself to the Online Information conference in London in December 2009, an event which focussed on developments with the semantic web. Pete’s reflections on the event can be found at http://thegiraffe.wordpress.com/2009/12/04/linked-open-data-web-or-not-the-semantic-web/ and http://thegiraffe.wordpress.com/2010/01/06/not-the-semantic-web-part-two/ . We went to the conference with some scepticism as to the slow pace of progress towards the semantic web since the seminal article written by Berners-Lee and others in 2001. We left aware that developments in semantic search technologies and in the assembly and analysis of linked data represent real steps towards a semantic web and are also significant in their own right.

== Background ==

Why might this matter to IKM?

First, the process of how new norms for knowledge, information and communication work emerge, may contain open or concealed political, cultural or economic biases and will, in any case, certainly affect how such work can then be carried out in the future. It relates directly to a fundamental argument of IKM that ICT have historically often been applied to development, and especially to the management of development organisations and development information, without proper consideration of their potential impact on development processes. This has involved, inter alia

*The use of proprietary ICT system development models which have precluded the collaborative creation, use and further adapation and re-use of development friendly open source software modules
*An uncritical acceptance of the tendency of many Management Information Systems, originating in the private sector, to centralise management controls in a way which has impacted on the capacity of local offices or grant recipients to manage their affairs in a manner sensitive to local context
*An unthinking acceptance as the inevitable ‘norm’of those new models of informational behaviour, both formal and informal, which have originated in the North, with little awareness either of Southern innovation or of the impact on (two way) development communication of privileging one culture of communication over others
*The increased prominence and power of information produced by larger, and wealthier organisations vis a vis their poorer, and especially Southern, critics
*A shift in the relative ‘information wealth’ in terms of production of and access to even development related information, between the South and the North - A lack of investment in off-line resources with the result that there is now less available in the form of guides and manuals for many development practitioners than there was 30 years ago.

 

Put bluntly, the introduction of ICT, Web 1 and Web 2 into the development sector has increased power and wealth imbalances within the sector, whilst arguably reducing the availability of information to many of those who can make most use of it. This was not inevitable. Alternative approaches and different models of technology development have been available from the start but, if noticed at all, they have received lip service rather than investment and support. The default position of senior management in the development sector has been the lazy one of either taking little notice at all or of buying into uncritical hype about innovation and digital futures. There are assumptions that ICT represent a homogenous block of technologies; that they offer no strategic choices, each with their implications for organisational and development practice; and that they can safely be left to technical departments and suppliers to sort out. We should strive to make sure the same mistakes are not repeated as the standards and operating norms of linked data and a semantic web develop.

A second and more specific line of thought relates to the potential contribution of semantic approaches to the linkage of development information. Development information, with its sources in so many disciplines, cultures and places is – and has always been – hard to categorise, hard to find. The notion of a collaboratively created development information environment or ecology has been something of a holy grail for some of us involved with IKM over many years. Despite our varied efforts –ELAND, IDML, assorted portals or information hubs, Euforic’s sophisticated use of Delicious tagging – the goal of ensuring that the right sort of relevant information from all relevant sources is available to those who need it in the form they need it has hardly been achieved in any one disciplinary branch of development, never mind its multiple transdisciplinary or cross-boundary communications needs. Attempting centralised answers never seems to catch everything and has huge resource implications. Decentralised approaches have stumbled on problems of metadata, of knowing what is there, of finding ways to share. However if other countries follow Britain, Finland and the US in making some sort of RDF compliance standard for all types of public information, then the scope for extending this to development information is obvious. How to do it in a way which meets the needs of all users, brings information in from all relevant sources and seeks to reduce rather than augment information assymmetries is considerably less obvious and could form the starting base for some practical collaboration in this field.

== Key Issues ==

Some of the main issues in the creation of ICT based on semantics and automatic machine-controlled exchange of information, which have development implications are:

'''The development process''': how will new practice come into being? Will a small number of well resourced organisations see this as a new area of competitive advantage, one where they can ‘take the lead’ or is a more collaborative approach possible? Can a number of organisations participate in a process of sharing ideas, work and cost, developing their own applications for their own purposes but doing so in a way which also contributes to building an open and shared information environment.

Within this, is there a distinction between open and linked data? I would argue that this represents more than a technical choice in how data are made available. To me the former simply consists of making an organisation’s data publicly available, a choice for linked data, however, implies an acceptance, even by the curators of data, of the value of a wider range of data sources and an acceptance of the impossibility (and possibly even the undesirability) of controlling how and by whom the data an organisation produces is interogated and analysed.

'''Permissions and source identification:''' I would imagine there will definitely be issues about data integrity and quality. Without knowing anything of the technical means likely to be deployed, there is already some literature on access and permissions – certainly as far as what streams of potentially incoming data are accepted and possibly, for all I know, on restrictions which can be embedded in the provision of feeds as well. There is clearly a need for full tracability with regard to sources and for barriers against spam or deliberate disinformation. What we would hope to avoid is a two tier world where data from the World Bank, OECD etc. gets automatically accepted whilst countervailing information from small Southern organisations gets blocked by quality control firewalls.

'''Ontologies: '''a frequent criticism of the semantic web has been that it requires the acceptance of a single global ontology in order to work. This does not in fact reflect the vision of Berners-Lee in his original paper where he says ‘Central control is stifling, and increasing the size and scope of such a system rapidly becomes unmanageable’. Current literature talks of ‘emergent ontolgies’, ‘heterogenuous ontologies’, ‘dynamic and networked ontologies’, all of which sound much better. However creating such open processes for ontology development and managing the process of translation between them in as multi-cultural, multi-layered and multi-disciplinary field as development is unlikely to be simple. It might be fun, but it won’t be easy.

A rare example of what I understand to be an rdf compliant ontology in a development related field is the Knowledge model of Agropedia, hosted by the Indian Institute of technology, Kanpur.

'''Schema:''' linked data is about making statements about information in three parts or in triplets: 1 information x has 2 some relationship with 3 information y. The relationship is identified within a schema which has its own unique www location which allows the definition of that relationship to be found be any person or machine that looks for it. There is nothing to stop everyone creating their own schema, although doing so may mean that it is harder for potential linkages between information to be discovered. Alternatively, large organisations may try to become the source of commonly adopted standard schema. However, a number of problems can be foreseen. Firstly, however innocuous the schema itself – for instance it may simply offer a definition of what ‘is in the same country as’ means – using schema from some of the large early adopters such as the CIA World Factbook or even the BBC, may not give the desired impression of neutrality. Second, it is hard to see how amibuitiy can (or even whether it should) be avoided. Starting with the term itseld, ‘development’ is full of words which are understyood in different ways, many of which may form the basis for the ralationships defined by schema. For example the what is really meant by ‘is a partner of’ or ‘is a stakeholder in’ may vary between different users of the same term. At the moment, there is a mechanism whereby creators of one schema can look for other schema which appear to be the same and link them using an ‘is the same as’ tag. As far as I know there are not yet conventions in force which allow ‘is similar to’ or ‘may have some resemblance to’.

'''Language:''' development ontologies and schema are complex within a single language. Given IKM’s general thinking on the importance of the use of local languages with which to discuss and manage development, it is imperative that efforts to ‘simplify’ the semantic web by making it an English web are resisted. Related Developments If we are thinking of some long term collaboration on these issues, there is also the question of whether it makes sense to focus solely on semantic web issues or to see how these will interact with other emerging, and possibly converging, ICT phenomena. These include

*The continuing development of social media
*Increasing use of visualisation as a tool for information analysis and communication ( a trend which will raise a host of issues about the intellectual justifications for the linkages and analyses made as well as posing very fundamental issues about the existence – or not - of cultural variations in our understanding of visual languages)
*The less dramatic but also significant work around spatial approaches to the analysis of developmental issues
*Orality and use of local language speech software (and whether the development of VXML standards – to be applied I believe in the management of call centres have any implications for this).

 

== Future Plans ==

IKM plans to develop its thinking on these issues in a number of ways.

It is talking about a possible collaboration with the Diplo Foundation and , hopefully either W3C or the W3 Foundation, to raise issues of policy and governance related to linked data and to advocate the adoption of rdf compliant systems for data handling within the UN system,

It plans to develop its own knowledge and practical experience of these issues through - Significant further development of Information Artefacts workspace and of topic map on our web site over the rest of this year. - Support for a Vines 2, to add linked data from other sources (Opencalais) to the exisitng software and to explore the potential use of IKM Vines as an Ontology Comparator - Work with the Yound Lives Project and others to explore the issues in codifying real life data sets and in exploring what new can then be done with them in terms of analysis and communication

These initiatives will contribute to IKM’s input to the Workshop proposed for November 2010.

It is hoped that the process of organising and holding the workshop will help us identify and develop relationships with a wider group of people with whom we might share a common interest on taking these issues forwartd in the development sector over the coming years. It will hopefully also take our ideas for what can be done and needs to be done significantly further forward as well. Workshop IKM plans to host a workshop, probably in Oxford, on the 15th and 16th of November this year. We could try and leave the 17th open for groups of us to plan further work. It is open to the idea of co-hosting it if other organisationsare interested.

The aims of the workshop will be to explore the current .situation with regard to the use of linked data (? and related innovations ) in the development sector, to discuss their implications for development in general and for the development information ecology in particular and to see if there is shared interest in collaborative work in this area. Particularly if there is a parallel ‘policy and governance’ thread in collaboration with the Diplo Foundation, the emphsis of the workshop could be on practical opportunities and the technical and developmental challenges these pose.

The content of the workshop needs to be planned in advance by the participants. At the least it would seem sensible to ask participants to tell us about any work they are doing in this area and IKM could present its work in progress.

So far this has involved IKM working group 2, Johannes Keizer from FAO, Julia Chandler and colleagues from the technical implementation side at DFID. We would hope to display some of the work described above coming out of IKM. Johannes has offered to talk about related work he is doing on - showing the use of AGROVOC in a collaborative environment and as linked data set that could glue together many information sets in agriculture - talking about Drupal developments to make Drupal a "Linked Data Producer" and a "linkend data consumer" - AgroTagger and intentions to create something like openCalais for agricultural information

We again should collectively consider who else we would like to invite.

== Organising Process ==

I would propose an open organising process in which all who express interest gets added to a workshop D Group and can participate in preparation for and the planning of the event

I hope this document will get steadily added to or altered as ideas progress

 {{Categories
|Category=Policy, English, Text, Opinion/ debates piece, Working papers, Infomed: Emerging Issues, Multiple Knowledges
}}

Workspaces:1:Linked Open Data

Timdavies — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 08:41:58 GMT

New page

== Exploring Linked Open Data ==

A demonstrator / pilot project is taking place between September and November 2010 working with data from the [http://www.younglives.org.uk/|Young Lives] project to explore the issues relating to making this available as linked open data online, and the possibilities to visualise and mash-up this data created by this. A workshop in November will explore the outcomes of the pilot and wider themes related to linked and open data in development information contexts.

See the [http://dgroups.org/Community.aspx?c=611203fb-bd2e-4d5f-a25c-96b078580f93|IKM Emergent Linked Data dGroup] for more context and discussion.

=== Young Lives Demonstrator ===

[[Workspaces:1:Literature Review|Literature Review]]

[[Workspaces:1:Working Notes|Working Notes]]

=== Other Resources ===

[[Workspaces:1:Semantic IKM Background Paper|Semantic IKM Background Paper]] by Mike Powel

{{Categories
|Category=Organisational practice, English, Text, Summary/ Overview, Infomed: Emerging Issues
}}

Workspaces:1. Information artefacts

Timdavies — Mon, 06 Sep 2010 08:08:14 GMT

Demonstrators:

← Older revision		Revision as of 08:08, 6 September 2010
(One intermediate revision not shown)
Line 78:		Line 78:
	== Demonstrators ==		== Demonstrators ==

		+	*[[Workspaces:1:Linked Open Data\|Exploring Linked Open Data]]
	*[[Workspaces:Vines Project\|Vines Project]]		*[[Workspaces:Vines Project\|Vines Project]]
	*[[Workspaces:Summaries Project\|Summaries Project]]		*[[Workspaces:Summaries Project\|Summaries Project]]

User:Timdavies

Mike — Sun, 05 Sep 2010 13:05:47 GMT

changed group membership for User:Timdavies from (none) to Upload, Workspaces and Thematics

New page

User:Timdavies

Timdavies — Sun, 05 Sep 2010 11:09:49 GMT

New user account

New page