The NSDL Registry: An Update

Diane I. Hillmann

Jon Phipps

Stuart Sutton

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NSDL Metadata Registry

● Handles ‘registration’ of Vocabularies

● The NSDL Metadata Registry uses SKOS as its primary vocabulary description language

● Provides feedback to the SKOS development community from an implementers perspective

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NSDL Metadata Registry

● Vocabulary Management Application– Provides a range of services to vocabulary owners and

consumers

● Provides a bridge between XML and RDF– Future support for import/export of other data formats

● Services to vocabulary owners– Permanent URIs and namespace maintenance– Group-based editorial and user management– Publishing with content negotiation– Simple versioning

● Subscriptions and Notification Services

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● Description of entire vocabulary as a collection of concepts

● Links to Concepts, History, Versions

● Default status and Language

● URI for the vocabulary itself (includes token)

● Links to Users● Links to XML schema

and RDF encoding

NSDL Metadata Registry: Example Concept Scheme registration

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NSDL Metadata Registry: Example Concept registration

● Required Preferred Label

● Multilanguage support● Permanent URI for the

Concept● Support for status● Links to other Concept

properties● Link to RDF fragment

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NSDL Metadata Registry: Example Concept Property editing

● Guided selection of Concept properties

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NSDL Metadata Registry: Example Concept Property editing

● Guided selection of Concept properties

● Guided selection of related concept when using a “relationship” property

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NSDL Metadata Registry: Example Concept Property editing

● Guided selection of Concept properties

● Guided selection of related concept when using a “relationship” property

● Support for property-level status

● Links to other Concept properties

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NSDL Metadata Registry: User Management

● Users and rights can be associated with specific Vocabularies

● Vocabulary admins can assign Users and editorial rights

● User creating a Vocabulary is automatically the admin

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NSDL Metadata Registry: HTTP Publishing

● Implements http content negotiation (W3C ‘Cookbook’) based on W3C TAG httpRange-14 for document retrieval– See the Recipes http://www.w3.org/TR/swbp-vocab-pub/

and http://norman.walsh.name/2005/06/19/httpRange-14

● We use ‘slash’ (/) URIs instead of ‘hash’ (#)– Hash URIs must return the entire document when

any fragment (identified by #) is requested

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NSDL Metadata Registry: HTTP Publishing

● Also implements extension-based document retrieval…– A request for a document of the type ‘application/rdf\+xml’

located at…http://metadataregistry.org/uri/NSDLEdLvl

– redirects to…http://metadataregistry.org/uri/NSDLEdLvl.rdf

– Which returns…

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Multilingual/Multiscript Support

● A contributed vocabulary from our Sandbox!● All prefLabels in Hebrew● Each concept has altLabels in English as well● Approach works well for two (maybe 3) languages/scripts, most

likely not infinitely expandable

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Individual Concept (multilingual)

● Each concept display includes prefLable, status, URI, language, and a list of all associated properties

● Each property also carries a language attribute, creating the potential for multi- language support for all thesaural information

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NSDL Metadata Registry: Versioning

● Time-slice versioning– Saves the state of the Scheme whenever a Concept

property is added or changed

● RESTful interface– Scheme or Concept state can be retrieved by appending an

encoded UTC Timestamp to URI…– e.g. scheme current trunk

http://metadataregistry.org/NSDLEdLvl

– e.g. scheme as of “2007-01-26T01:15:38.000Z” http://metadataregistry.org/NSDLEdLvl/2007-01-26T01%3A15%3A38.000Z

● Only Concept properties that have ‘Published’ state● Provides a permanent URI for Scheme/Concept at any

given point in time -- helps minimize ‘version churn’

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NSDL Metadata Registry: Versioning

● Named versions– Identifies an ‘official’ version by naming a time-slice– Vocabulary admin may apply a version name to any time-

slice in the past

● RESTful interface– Scheme or Concept state can be retrieved by appending a

version to URI…– e.g. scheme as of “2007-01-26T01:15:38.000Z”

http://metadataregistry.org/NSDLEdLvl/2007-01-26T01%3A15%3A38.000Z

permanently named “Release Version 1.2”http://metadataregistry.org/NSDLEdLvl/release_version_1.2

● Currently no support for editable branches

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NSDL Metadata Registry: Example History of Change Display (beta)

● Linked Date Stamp

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NSDL Metadata Registry: Example History of Change Display (beta)

● Linked Date Stamp● Linked Concept URI

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NSDL Metadata Registry: Example History of Change Display (beta)

● Linked Date Stamp● Linked Concept URI● Linked prefLabel

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NSDL Metadata Registry: Example History of Change Display (beta)

● Linked Date Stamp● Linked Concept URI● Linked prefLabel● Linked property

changed/added

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NSDL Metadata Registry: Example History of Change Display (beta)

● Linked Date Stamp● Linked Concept URI● Linked prefLabel● Linked property

changed/added● Viewable action,

changes, user

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NSDL Metadata Registry: Example History of Change Display (beta)

● Linked Date Stamp● Linked Concept URI● Linked prefLabel● Linked property

changed/added● Viewable action,

changes, user● [Still a work in

progress!]

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Links

NSDL Metadata Registryhttp://metadataregistry.orgPlease play in our sandbox!http://sandbox.metadataregistry.org

The Registry blog (multi-user, available to all interested)http://metadataregistry.org/blog

Diane Hillmann mailto:dih1@cornell.eduJon Phipps mailto:jphipps@madcreek.com

Thanks for listening