article

ActiveRDF: Embedding Semantic Web data into object-oriented languages

Authors:

Benjamin Heitmann,

Stefan DeckerAuthors Info & Claims

Web Semantics: Science, Services and Agents on the World Wide Web, Volume 6, Issue 3

Pages 191 - 202

https://doi.org/10.1016/j.websem.2008.04.003

Published: 01 September 2008 Publication History

Abstract

Semantic Web applications share a large portion of development effort with database-driven Web applications. Existing approaches for development of these database-driven applications cannot be directly applied to Semantic Web data due to differences in the underlying data model. We develop a mapping approach that embeds Semantic Web data into object-oriented languages and thereby enables reuse of existing Web application frameworks. We analyse the relation between the Semantic Web and the Web, and survey the typical data access patterns in Semantic Web applications. We discuss the mismatch between object-oriented programming languages and Semantic Web data, for example in the semantics of class membership, inheritance relations, and object conformance to schemas. We present ActiveRDF, an object-oriented API for managing RDF data that offers full manipulation and querying of RDF data, does not rely on a schema and fully conforms to RDF(S) semantics. ActiveRDF can be used with different RDF data stores: adapters have been implemented to generic SPARQL endpoints, Sesame, Jena, Redland and YARS and new adapters can be added easily. We demonstrate the usage of ActiveRDF and its integration with the popular Ruby on Rails framework which enables rapid development of Semantic Web applications.

References

[1]

Abecker, A. and van Elst, L., Ontologies for knowledge management. In: Staab, S., Studer, R. (Eds.), Handbook on Ontologies, Springer. pp. 435-454.

[2]

Adya, A., Blakeley, J.A., Melnik, S. and Muralidhar, S., Anatomy of the ADO.NET entity framework. In: Proceedings of the ACM SIGMOD International Conference on Management of Data, pp. 877-888.

Digital Library

[3]

Ankolekar, A., Krötzsch, M., Tran, T. and Vrandecic, D., The two cultures: mashing up Web 2.0 and the Semantic Web. In: Proceedings of the International World-Wide Web Conference, pp. 825-834.

Digital Library

[4]

Bauer, C. and King, G., Hibernate in Action. 2004. Manning Publications.

Digital Library

[5]

Beckett, D., The design and implementation of the Redland RDF application framework. Computer Networks. v39 i5. 577-588.

[6]

Berners-Lee, T., Linked Data. 2006. W3C Design Issues.

[7]

Bizer, C. and Cyganiak, R., D2R server: Publishing relational databases on the Semantic Web. In: Proceedings of the International Semantic Web Conference (ISWC),

[8]

Bojars, U., Heitmann, B. and Oren, E., A prototype to explore content and context on social community sites. In: Proceedings of the International Conference on Social Semantic Web (CSSW), September, pp. 47-58.

[9]

Breslin, J.G., Harth, A., Boj¿rs, U. and Decker, S., Towards semantically-interlinked online communities. In: Proceedings of the European Semantic Web Conference (ESWC),

Digital Library

[10]

Broekstra, J., Kampman, A. and van Harmelen, F., Sesame: a generic architecture for storing and querying RDF and RDF Schema. In: Proceedings of the International Semantic Web Conference (ISWC), pp. 54-68.

Digital Library

[11]

S. Burbeck, Applications Programming in Smalltalk-80: How to use Model-View-Controller, 1987.

[12]

Carroll, J.J., Bizer, C., Hayes, P. and Stickler, P., Named graphs, provenance and trust. In: Proceedings of the International Semantic Web Conference (ISWC), pp. 613-622.

Digital Library

[13]

Castro, P., Melnik, S. and Adya, A., ADO.NET entity framework: raising the level of abstraction in data programming. In: Proceedings of the ACM SIGMOD International Conference on Management of Data, pp. 1070-1072.

Digital Library

[14]

Ceri, S., Fraternali, P. and Bongio, A., Web modeling language (WebML): A modeling language for designing web sites. In: Proceedings of the International World-Wide Web Conference, pp. 137-157.

Digital Library

[15]

Ceri, S., Fraternali, P., Bongio, A., Brambilla, M., Comai, S. and Matera, M., Designing Data-Intensive Web Applications. 2002. Morgan Kaufmann.

Digital Library

[16]

Corcho, O., López-Cima, A. and Gómez-Pérez, A., A platform for the development of Semantic Web portals. In: Proceedings of the International Conference on Web Engineering, pp. 145-152.

Digital Library

[17]

In: Davies, J., Fensel, D., van Harmelen, F. (Eds.), Towards the Semantic Web: Ontology-driven Knowledge Management, John Wiley & Sons, Ltd., New York, NY, USA.

Digital Library

[18]

S. Decker, Semantic web methods for knowledge management. Ph.D. Thesis, Universität Karlsruhe, 2002.

[19]

Decker, S., Erdmann, M., Fensel, D. and Studer, R., Ontobroker: Ontology based access to distributed and semi-structured unformation. In: Meersman, R. (Ed.), Semantic Issues in Multimedia Systems, Kluwer Academic Publisher. pp. 351-369.

Digital Library

[20]

van Deursen, A., Klint, P. and Visser, J., Domain-specific languages: an annotated bibliography. ACM SIGPLAN Notices. v35 i6. 26-36.

Digital Library

[21]

Dong, X., Halevy, A. and Madhavan, J., Reference reconciliation in complex information spaces. In: Proceedings of the ACM SIGMOD International Conference on Management of Data, pp. 85-96.

Digital Library

[22]

Facca, F.M. and Brambilla, M., Extending WebML towards Semantic Web. In: Proceedings of the International World-Wide Web Conference,

Digital Library

[23]

Fensel, D., van Harmelen, F., Horrocks, I., McGuinness, D. and Patel-Schneider, P.F., OIL: An ontology infrastructure for the semantic web. IEEE Intelligent Systems. v16 i2. 38-45.

Digital Library

[24]

Fernández, M.F., Florescu, D., Levy, A.Y. and Suciu, D., Declarative specification of web sites with strudel. The VLDB Journal. v9 i1. 38-55.

Digital Library

[25]

Florescu, D., Levy, A. and Mendelzon, A., Database techniques for the World-Wide Web: a survey. SIGMOD Record. v27 i3. 59-74.

Digital Library

[26]

Fowler, M., Patterns of Enterprise Application Architecture. 2002. Addison-Wesley.

Digital Library

[27]

Frohn, J., Lausen, G. and Uphoff, H., Access to objects by path expressions and rules. In: Proceedings of the International Conference on Very Large Data Bases (VLDB), pp. 273-284.

Digital Library

[28]

Garlan, D. and Shaw, M., An introduction to software architecture. In: Ambriola, V., Tortora, G. (Eds.), Advances in Software Engineering and Knowledge Engineering, vol. 1. World Scientific Publishing Company. pp. 1-39.

[29]

Gruber, T.R., Toward principles for the design of ontologies used for knowledge sharing?. International Journal of Human-Computer Studies. v43 i5-6. 907-928.

Digital Library

[30]

S. Handschuh, Creating ontology-based metadata by annotation for the Semantic Web. Ph.D. Thesis, Universität Karlsruhe, 2005.

[31]

van Harmelen, F., Semantic Web research anno 2006: main streams, popular fallacies, current status and future challenges. In: Proceedings of the International Workshop on Cooperative Information Agents (CIA), pp. 1-7.

Digital Library

[32]

Harth, A. and Decker, S., Optimized index structures for querying RDF from the web. In: Proceedings of the Latin-American Web Congress (LA-Web), pp. 71-80.

Digital Library

[33]

B. Heitmann, Transitioning web application frameworks towards the semantic web. Master's Thesis, Universität Karlsruhe, 2007.

[34]

Heitmann, B. and Oren, E., Leveraging existing web frameworks for a SIOC explorer to browse online social communities. In: Proceedings of the ESWC Workshop on Scripting for the Semantic Web, June, pp. 52-61.

[35]

Houben, G.-J., Barna, P., Frasincar, F. and Vdovjak, R., Hera: Development of Semantic Web information systems. In: Proceedings of the International Conference on Web Engineering, pp. 529-538.

Digital Library

[36]

Jhingran, A., Enterprise information mashups: Integrating information, simply. In: Proceedings of the International Conference on Very Large Data Bases (VLDB), pp. 3-4.

Digital Library

[37]

Jin, Y., Xu, S., Decker, S. and Wiederhold, G., Managing web sites with OntoWebber. In: Proceedings of the International Conference on Extending Database Technology (EDBT), pp. 766-768.

Digital Library

[38]

Kiryakov, A., Popov, B., Terziev, I., Manov, D. and Ognyanof, D., Semantic annotation, indexing, and retrieval. Journal of Web Semantics. v2 i1. 49-79.

Digital Library

[39]

Klapsing, R., Semantics in web engineering: applying the resource description framework. IEEE Multimedia. v8 i2. 62-68.

Digital Library

[40]

Krasner, G.E. and Pope, S.T., A cookbook for using the model-view-controller user interface paradigm in Smalltalk-80. Journal of Object-oriented Programming. v1 i3. 26-49.

Digital Library

[41]

Lassila, O. and Hendler, J., Embracing "Web 3. 0". IEEE Internet Computing. v11 i3. 90-93.

Digital Library

[42]

Lawrence, S. and Giles, C.L., Searching the World Wide Web. Science. v280 i5360. 98-100.

[43]

Lawrence, S. and Giles, C.L., Accessibility of information on the Web. Nature. v400. 107

[44]

Lima, F. and Schwabe, D., Application modeling for the Semantic Web. In: Proceedings of the Latin-American Web Congress (LA-Web), pp. 93-102.

Digital Library

[45]

Maedche, A., Staab, S., Stojanovic, N., Studer, R. and Sure, Y., Semantic portal: The SEAL approach. In: Fensel, D., Hendler, J.A., Lieberman, H., Wahlster, W. (Eds.), Spinning the Semantic Web, MIT Press. pp. 317-359.

[46]

Melnik, S., Adya, A. and Bernstein, P.A., Compiling mappings to bridge applications and databases. In: Proceedings of the ACM SIGMOD International Conference on Management of Data, pp. 461-472.

Digital Library

[47]

Mentzas, G.N., Apostolou, D., Abecker, A. and Young, R., Knowledge Asset Management. 2003. Springer.

[48]

Musser, J., Web 2. 0 Principles and Best Practices. 2007. O'Reilly Radar. O'Reilly Media.

[49]

Nussbaumer, M., Freudenstein, P. and Gaedke, M., Towards DSL-based web engineering. In: Proceedings of the International World-Wide Web Conference, pp. 893-894.

Digital Library

[50]

O'Leary, D.E., Using AI in knowledge management: knowledge bases and ontologies. IEEE Intelligent Systems. v13 i3. 34-39.

Digital Library

[51]

T. O'Reilly, What is Web 2.0-design patterns and business models for the next generation of software, 2005.

[52]

Oren, E., Delbru, R., Catasta, M., Cyganiak, R., Stenzhorn, H. and Tummarello, G., Sindice. com: a document-oriented lookup index for open linked data, International Journal of Metadata. Semantics and Ontologies. v3 i1.

Digital Library

[53]

Oren, E., Delbru, R. and Decker, S., Extending faceted navigation for RDF data. In: Proceedings of the International Semantic Web Conference (ISWC), November, pp. 559-572.

Digital Library

[54]

Oren, E., Delbru, R., Gerke, S., Haller, A. and Decker, S., ActiveRDF: object-oriented semantic web programming. In: Proceedings of the International World-Wide Web Conference, May, pp. 817-823.

Digital Library

[55]

Oren, E., Gerke, S. and Decker, S., Simple algorithms for predicate suggestions using similarity and co-occurrence. In: Proceedings of the European Semantic Web Conference (ESWC), June, pp. 160-174.

Digital Library

[56]

Oren, E., Mesnage, C., Heitmann, B., Haller, A., Hauswirth, M. and Decker, S., A flexible integration framework for Semantic Web 2.0 applications. IEEE Software. v24 iSeptember 5. 64-71.

Digital Library

[57]

Ousterhout, J.K., Scripting: higher-level programming for the 21st century. IEEE Computer. v31 i3. 23-30.

Digital Library

[58]

Paulson, L.D., Building rich web applications with Ajax. IEEE Computer. v38 i10. 14-17.

Digital Library

[59]

Plessers, P. and Troyer, O.D., Annotation for the Semantic Web during website development. In: Proceedings of the International Conference on Web Engineering, pp. 349-353.

[60]

Raghavan, S. and Garcia-Molina, H., Crawling the hidden web. In: Proceedings of the International Conference on Very Large Data Bases (VLDB), pp. 129-138.

Digital Library

[61]

T. Reenskaug, Models, views, controllers. Tech. rep., Xerox PARC, (1979).

[62]

G. Reif, WEESA-web engineering for Semantic Web applications. Ph.D. Thesis, Technische Universität Wien, 2005.

[63]

Rumbaugh, J., Blaha, M., Premerali, W., Eddy, F. and Lorensen, W., Object-Oriented Modelling and Design. 1991. Prentice-Hall, Englewood Cliffs, New Jersey.

Digital Library

[64]

L. Sauermann, R. Cyganiak, M. Völkel, Cool URIs for the Semantic Web. Tech. Re TM-07-01, DFKI, 2007

[65]

Sauermann, L., Semantic desktop 2.0: The Gnowsis experience. In: Proceedings of the International Semantic Web Conference (ISWC), pp. 887-900.

Digital Library

[66]

Schwabe, D., Rossi, G. and Barbosa, S., Systematic hypermedia application design with OOHDM. In: Proceedings of the ACM Conference on HyperText and Hypermedia, pp. 116-128.

Digital Library

[67]

Shadbolt, N., Berners-Lee, T. and Hall, W., The Semantic Web revisited. IEEE Intelligent Systems. v21 i3. 96-101.

Digital Library

[68]

Silverman, M., James Surowiecki: the wisdom of crowds-review. American Journal of Physics. v75 iFebruary2. 190-192.

[69]

van der Sluijs, K., Houben, G.-J., Broekstra, J. and Casteleyn, S., Hera-S: Web design using Sesame. In: Proceedings of the International Conference on Web Engineering, pp. 337-344.

Digital Library

[70]

Surowiecki, J., The Wisdom of Crowds. 2005. Anchor.

Digital Library

[71]

Thomas, D., Hansson, D., Breedt, L., Clark, M., Davidson, J.D. and Schwartz, J.G.A., Agile Web Development with Rails. 2007. 2nd ed. Pragmatic Bookshelf.

Digital Library

[72]

Tummarello, G., Delbru, R. and Oren, E., Sindice. com: Weaving the open linked data. In: Proceedings of the International Semantic Web Conference (ISWC), November, pp. 552-565.

Digital Library

[73]

Ullman, J.D., Principles of Database and Knowledge Base Systems, vol. 2. 1989. Computer Science Press.

Digital Library

[74]

Vdovjak, R., Frasincar, F., Houben, G.-J. and Barna, P., Engineering Semantic Web information systems in Hera. Journal of Web Engineering. v2 i1-2. 3-26.

Digital Library

[75]

Wilkinson, K., Sayers, C., Kuno, H.A. and Reynolds, D., Efficient RDF storage and retrieval in Jena2. In: Proceedings of the International Workshop on Semantic Web and Databases (SWDB),

Cited By

Kamburjan EKlungre VGiese M(2022)Never Mind the Semantic Gap: Modular, Lazy and Safe Loading of RDF DataThe Semantic Web10.1007/978-3-031-06981-9_12(200-216)Online publication date: 29-May-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/978-3-031-06981-9_12
Ledvinka MKřemen P(2019)Formalizing Object-Ontological Mapping Using F-logicRules and Reasoning10.1007/978-3-030-31095-0_7(97-112)Online publication date: 16-Sep-2019
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/978-3-030-31095-0_7
Saeed MChelmis CPrasanna VLinares López C(2018)ASQForAI Communications10.3233/AIC-17074631:1(19-32)Online publication date: 1-Feb-2018
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.3233/AIC-170746
Show More Cited By

Index Terms

ActiveRDF: Embedding Semantic Web data into object-oriented languages
1. Computing methodologies
  1. Artificial intelligence
    1. Knowledge representation and reasoning
      1. Semantic networks
2. Software and its engineering
  1. Software notations and tools
    1. General programming languages
      1. Language types
        Object oriented languages

Recommendations

ActiveRDF: object-oriented semantic web programming
WWW '07: Proceedings of the 16th international conference on World Wide Web

Object-oriented programming is the current mainstream programming paradigm but existing RDF APIs are mostly triple-oriented. Traditional techniques for bridging a similar gap between relational databases and object-oriented programs cannot be applied ...
Layered RDF: An object-oriented approach to web information representation

Based on XML, RDF(S) has been recommended as the basic layer of the Semantic Web, providing a foundation for the higher layers of ontology, logic and trust. Although RDF(S) enables specification and identification of data and relationships between data, ...
OLS: An Ontology Based Information System
CISIS '08: Proceedings of the 2008 International Conference on Complex, Intelligent and Software Intensive Systems

This paper presents a design ontology that deals with the hypermedia presentation aspects involved in the development of a Semantic Web Information System. The ontology is driven by two main design models: the Conceptual and the Application models. The ...

Comments

Information & Contributors

Information

Published In

Copyright © Elsevier B.V. © 2008.

Publisher

Elsevier Science Publishers B. V.

Netherlands

Publication History

Published: 01 September 2008

Author Tags

Qualifiers

Article

Contributors

Other Metrics

View Article Metrics

Bibliometrics & Citations

Bibliometrics

Article Metrics

18
Total Citations
View Citations
0
Total Downloads

Downloads (Last 12 months)0
Downloads (Last 6 weeks)0

Reflects downloads up to 03 Oct 2024

Other Metrics

View Author Metrics

Citations

Cited By

Kamburjan EKlungre VGiese M(2022)Never Mind the Semantic Gap: Modular, Lazy and Safe Loading of RDF DataThe Semantic Web10.1007/978-3-031-06981-9_12(200-216)Online publication date: 29-May-2022
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/978-3-031-06981-9_12
Ledvinka MKřemen P(2019)Formalizing Object-Ontological Mapping Using F-logicRules and Reasoning10.1007/978-3-030-31095-0_7(97-112)Online publication date: 16-Sep-2019
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/978-3-030-31095-0_7
Saeed MChelmis CPrasanna VLinares López C(2018)ASQForAI Communications10.3233/AIC-17074631:1(19-32)Online publication date: 1-Feb-2018
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.3233/AIC-170746
Ledvinka MBlaško MKřemen P(2018)Factors of Efficient Semantic Web Application DevelopmentOn the Move to Meaningful Internet Systems. OTM 2018 Conferences10.1007/978-3-030-02671-4_35(565-572)Online publication date: 22-Oct-2018
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/978-3-030-02671-4_35
Holanda OIsotani SBittencourt IDermeval DAlcantara W(2017)An object triple mapping system supporting detached objectsEngineering Applications of Artificial Intelligence10.1016/j.engappai.2017.04.01062:C(234-251)Online publication date: 1-Jun-2017
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1016/j.engappai.2017.04.010
Leinberger MLämmel RStaab S(2017)The Essence of Functional Programming on Semantic DataProgramming Languages and Systems10.1007/978-3-662-54434-1_28(750-776)Online publication date: 25-Apr-2017
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/978-3-662-54434-1_28
El-Khoury JEkelin CEkholm C(2016)Supporting the Linked Data Approach to Maintain Coherence Across Rich EMF ModelsProceedings of the 12th European Conference on Modelling Foundations and Applications - Volume 976410.1007/978-3-319-42061-5_3(36-47)Online publication date: 6-Jul-2016
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1007/978-3-319-42061-5_3
Staab SZiegler JNebeling MNigay L(2015)The semantic webProceedings of the 7th ACM SIGCHI Symposium on Engineering Interactive Computing Systems10.1145/2774225.2777465(242-243)Online publication date: 23-Jun-2015
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/2774225.2777465
Hu BRodrigues EViel E(2014)CapriProceedings of the 16th International Conference on Information Integration and Web-based Applications & Services10.1145/2684200.2684336(217-223)Online publication date: 4-Dec-2014
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.1145/2684200.2684336
De Souza Bomfim MSchwabe D(2011)Design and implementation of linked data applications using SHDM and synthProceedings of the 11th international conference on Web engineering10.5555/2027776.2027787(121-136)Online publication date: 20-Jun-2011
https://dl.acm.org/doi/10.5555/2027776.2027787
Show More Cited By

View Options

View options

Get Access

Login options

Check if you have access through your login credentials or your institution to get full access on this article.

Full Access

Get this Publication

Media

Figures

Other

Tables

View Issue’s Table of Contents