-status and challenges

- presentation to the Semic.eu Advisory Group Meeting in Brussels, 15.10.2009

Semantics in Norway

- Svein Ølnes, Vestlandsforsking

www.vestforsk.no

Resource network for eGovernment

www.rnef.no

Funded by the Norwegian Research CouncilResearchers

Public sector agencies

ICT industry

www.vestforsk.no

Naming things!

The drawing (cartoon) by Gary Larson showing the man who has just painted ’house’, ’tree’, ’door’, ’cat’, ’dog’ ++ on the thing itself and says: ”Now, that shouldclear up a few things around here”

This cartoon says more about how to deal with semantic challenges than most modelsaround!It is a brilliant illustration of the important first step in working with semantics: namingthings (concepts)

The cartoon is also good for what it does not show: relations-it does not say anything about who owns the house, the cat, and the dog (though it probably is the man on the drawing)-it does not say anything about the relation between the cat and the dog (it is probably bad, but it’s still a relation!)

www.vestforsk.no

Outline

Semantics in Norway: Status

Special for Norway: Semantic web/Topic Maps

Current semantic activities

Two cases:Los – a Navigator for Public Sector Services (Front office)

SERES – Semantic Back Office Solution

www.vestforsk.no

Technology waves

Procedure orientedFocus: SyntacsData: Hierarchical

Object orientedFocus: StructureData: Relational

Component basedFocus: ServicesData: XML

Model drivenFocus: SemanticData: Ontologi & Data

19951975 2005 201519851965

Stian Danenbarger, Bouvet.no

www.vestforsk.no

Semantics in Norway

2007: White paper on a common architecture for public sector

focus on Service Oriented Architecture (SOA)

little said about the semantic challenges

2009: Work started on describing standards and tools for definition of terms

Marks the start of a more ambitious effort in the work withsemantic interoperability

www.vestforsk.no

Special for Norway: SemWeb and Topic Maps

Contrary to most other European countries Norway has a relativelyhuge installed base of Topic Maps solutions (ISO 13250:2003)

Topic Maps a common semantic platform for public sector portals

Active and knowledgeable ICT consultancyactive in standards development (ISO)

established products supporting the standard

active in implementing Topic Maps based solutions to customers

Some tension and competitions between the two communitieswhich after all is good – competition provides for better solutions

www.vestforsk.no

Los: A navigator to public sector services

www.vestforsk.no

Los: Small pieces loosely joined

Navigator to public services

A controlled vocabulary (thesaurus) describing public servicesexpressions used by the citizens mapped to agencies’ own terms

Used by almost 100 Norwegian municipalities

Metadata expressed in Dublin Core

Example: The term ’kindergarten’ will link resources from various public organisations

Core system implemented in Topic Maps

www.vestforsk.no

Los: Ontologi on a general levelNotice the distinction between services and resources thatdescribe services (Los is about the latter)

Net resourcePublic service

(e.g. Kindergarten) Keyword

Los ontology

Theme(Category)

www.vestforsk.no

Agreement on terms (mostly used in electronic forms)formal terms used by public sector organisations

Support for the new Altinn IIAltinn is Norway’s main channel for electronic reporting (by 2009 29 public service providers use this channel for their online forms)

Central repositoryto be maintained by the agencies themselves

SERES: Serious semantic back office standardization

www.vestforsk.no

Ultimate goal: My metadata is your data (and vice versa)

SERES

Lovdata

LOS

Europeana

KS

Smilno

Volven

Yr.no

Kart-verket

SKD

SSB

www.vestforsk.no

Thank you for your attention!

Contact information:Svein Ølnes – sol@vestforsk.no