The Semantic Web Vision: Grigoris Antoniou Frank Van Harmelen

Chapter 1
The Semantic Web Vision
Grigoris Antoniou
Frank van Harmelen
Chapter 1
A Semantic Web Primer
Lecture Outline
1.
2.
3.
4.
Todays Web
The Semantic Web Impact
Semantic Web Technologies
A Layered Approach
Chapter 1
Todays Web
Most of todays Web content is suitable for human

consumption
Typical Web uses today peoples
Even Web content that is generated automatically from

databases is usually presented without the original
structural information found in databases
seeking and making use of information, searching for and
getting in touch with other people, reviewing catalogs of
online stores and ordering products by filling out forms
Chapter 1
Keyword-Based Search Engines

Current
Web activities are not particularly

well supported by software tools
Except for keyword-based search engines (e.g.

Google, AltaVista, Yahoo)
The
Web would not have been the huge

success it was, were it not for search engines
Chapter 1
Problems of Keyword-Based
Search Engines
High
recall, low precision.

Low or no recall
Results are highly sensitive to vocabulary
Results are single Web pages
Human involvement is necessary to interpret
and combine results
Results of Web searches are not readily
accessible by other software tools
5
Chapter 1
The Key Problem of Todays Web

The
meaning of Web content is not machineaccessible: lack of semantics

It is simply difficult to distinguish the meaning
between these two sentences:
I am a professor of computer science.
I am a professor of computer science,
you may think. Well, . . .
6
Chapter 1
The Semantic Web Approach

Represent
Web content in a form that is

more easily machine-processable.
Use intelligent techniques to take advantage
of these representations.
The Semantic Web will gradually evolve out
of the existing Web, it is not a competition to
the current WWW
7
Chapter 1
Lecture Outline
1.
2.
3.
4.
Todays Web
A Layered Approach
Chapter 1

Knowledge Management
Knowledge management concerns itself with

acquiring, accessing, and maintaining knowledge
within an organization
Key activity of large businesses: internal knowledge
as an intellectual asset
It is particularly important for international,
geographically dispersed organizations
Most information is currently available in a weakly
structured form (e.g. text, audio, video)
Chapter 1
Limitations of Current Knowledge

Management Technologies
Searching information
Extracting information
inconsistencies in terminology, outdated information.
Viewing information
10
human involvement necessary for browsing, retrieving,

interpreting, combining
Maintaining information
Keyword-based search engines
Impossible to define views on Web knowledge
Chapter 1
Semantic Web Enabled Knowledge

Management
11
Knowledge will be organized in conceptual spaces

according to its meaning.
Automated tools for maintenance and knowledge
discovery
Semantic query answering
Query answering over several documents
Defining who may view certain parts of information
(even parts of documents) will be possible.
Chapter 1

B2C Electronic Commmerce
A
typical scenario: user visits one or several

online shops, browses their offers, selects
and orders products.
Ideally humans would visit all, or all major
online stores; but too time consuming
Shopbots are a useful tool
12
Chapter 1
Limitations of Shopbots
They
rely on wrappers: extensive

programming required
Wrappers need to be reprogrammed when
an online store changes its outfit
Wrappers extract information based on
textual analysis
13
Error-prone
Limited information extracted
Chapter 1
Semantic Web Enabled B2C

Electronic Commerce
Software
agents that can interpret the

product information and the terms of service.
Pricing and product information, delivery and

privacy policies will be interpreted and compared
to the user requirements.
Information
about the reputation of shops

Sophisticated shopping agents will be able to
conduct automated negotiations
14
Chapter 1

B2B Electronic Commerce
Greatest
economic promise
Currently relies mostly on EDI
Isolated technology, understood only by experts

Difficult to program and maintain, error-prone
Each B2B communication requires separate
programming
Web
15
appears to be perfect infrastructure
But B2B not well supported by Web standards

Chapter 1
Semantic Web Enabled B2B Electronic

Commerce
16
Businesses enter partnerships without much

overhead
Differences in terminology will be resolved using
standard abstract domain models
Data will be interchanged using translation services.
Auctioning, negotiations, and drafting contracts will
be carried out automatically (or semi-automatically)
by software agents
Chapter 1
Wikis
Collections
of web pages that allow users to

add content via a browser interface
Wiki systems allow for collaborative
knowledge
Users are free to add and change
information without ownership of content,
access restrictions, or rigid workflows
17
Chapter 1
Some Uses of Wikis

Development
of bodies of knowledge in a
community effort, with contributions from a
wide range of users (e.g. Wikipedia)
Knowledge management of an activity or a
project (e.g. brainstorming and exchanging
ideas, coordinating activities, exchanging
records of meetings)
18
Chapter 1
Semantic Web Enabled Wikis
The inherent structure of a wiki, given by the linking

between pages, gets accessible to machines beyond
mere navigation
Structured text and untyped hyperlinks are enriched
by semantic annotations referring to an underlying
model of the knowledge captured by the wiki
19
e.g. a hyperlink from Knossos to Heraklion could be annotated with

information is located in. This information could then be used for
context-specific presentations of pages, advanced querying, and
consistency verification
Chapter 1
Lecture Outline
1.
2.
3.
4.
20
Todays Web
A Layered Approach
Chapter 1

Explicit
Metadata
Ontologies
Logic and Inference
Agents
21
Chapter 1
On HTML
Web
content is currently formatted for human

readers rather than programs
HTML is the predominant language in which
Web pages are written (directly or using
tools)
Vocabulary describes presentation
22
Chapter 1
An HTML Example
<h1>Agilitas Physiotherapy Centre</h1>
Welcome to the home page of the Agilitas Physiotherapy Centre. Do
you feel pain? Have you had an injury? Let our staff Lisa Davenport,
Kelly Townsend (our lovely secretary) and Steve Matthews take care
of your body and soul.
<h2>Consultation hours</h2>
Mon 11am - 7pm<br>
Tue 11am - 7pm<br>
Wed 3pm - 7pm<br>
Thu 11am - 7pm<br>
Fri 11am - 3pm<p>
But note that we do not offer consultation during the weeks of the
<a href=". . .">State Of Origin</a> games.
23
Chapter 1
Problems with HTML

Humans
have no problem with this

Machines (software agents) do:
24
How distinguish therapists from the secretary,

How determine exact consultation hours
They would have to follow the link to the State Of
Origin games to find when they take place.
Chapter 1
A Better Representation
<company>
<treatmentOffered>Physiotherapy</treatmentOffered>
<companyName>Agilitas Physiotherapy
Centre</companyName>
<staff>
<therapist>Lisa Davenport</therapist>
<therapist>Steve Matthews</therapist>
<secretary>Kelly Townsend</secretary>
</staff>
</company>
25
Chapter 1
Explicit Metadata
This
representation is far more easily

processable by machines
Metadata: data about data
Metadata capture part of the meaning of data
Semantic
Web does not rely on text-based

manipulation, but rather on machineprocessable metadata
26
Chapter 1
Ontologies
The term ontology originates from philosophy
The study of the nature of existence
Different meaning from computer science
An ontology is an explicit and formal
specification of a conceptualization
27
Chapter 1
Typical Components of Ontologies
Terms denote important concepts (classes of

objects) of the domain
Relationships between these terms: typically class

hierarchies
28
e.g. professors, staff, students, courses, departments
a class C to be a subclass of another class C' if every

object in C is also included in C'
e.g. all professors are staff members
Chapter 1
Further Components of Ontologies
Properties:
Value restrictions
e.g. faculty and general staff are disjoint
Logical relationships between objects
29
e.g. only faculty members can teach courses
Disjointness statements
e.g. X teaches Y
e.g. every department must include at least 10 faculty
Chapter 1
Example of a Class Hierarchy
30
Chapter 1
The Role of Ontologies on the Web

Ontologies
provide a shared understanding

of a domain: semantic interoperability
overcome differences in terminology

mappings between ontologies
Ontologies
are useful for the organization

and navigation of Web sites
31
Chapter 1
The Role of Ontologies in Web Search
Ontologies are useful for improving the accuracy of

Web searches
Web searches can exploit generalization/

specialization information
32
search engines can look for pages that refer to a precise

concept in an ontology
If a query fails to find any relevant documents, the search

engine may suggest to the user a more general query.
If too many answers are retrieved, the search engine may
suggest to the user some specializations.
Chapter 1
Web Ontology Languages

RDF Schema
RDF is a data model for objects and relations
between them
RDF Schema is a vocabulary description language
Describes properties and classes of RDF
resources
Provides semantics for generalization hierarchies
of properties and classes
33
Chapter 1
Web Ontology Languages (2)

OWL
A richer ontology language
relations between classes
e.g., disjointness
cardinality
e.g. exactly one
richer
typing of properties
characteristics of properties (e.g., symmetry)
34
Chapter 1
Logic and Inference

Logic
is the discipline that studies the

principles of reasoning
Formal languages for expressing knowledge
Well-understood formal semantics
Declarative knowledge: we describe what holds

without caring about how it can be deduced
Automated
reasoners can deduce (infer)

conclusions from the given knowledge
35
Chapter 1
An Inference Example
prof(X) faculty(X)
faculty(X) staff(X)
prof(michael)
We can deduce the following conclusions:
faculty(michael)
staff(michael)
prof(X) staff(X)
36
Chapter 1
Logic versus Ontologies

The
previous example involves knowledge

typically found in ontologies
Logic can be used to uncover ontological

knowledge that is implicitly given
It can also help uncover unexpected relationships
and inconsistencies
Logic
37
is more general than ontologies
It can also be used by intelligent agents for

making decisions and selecting courses of action
Chapter 1
Tradeoff between Expressive Power

and Computational Complexity
The more expressive a logic is, the more

computationally expensive it becomes to draw
conclusions
Our previous examples involved rules If conditions,

then conclusion, and only finitely many objects
38
Drawing certain conclusions may become impossible if noncomputability barriers are encountered.
This subset of logic is tractable and is supported by efficient

reasoning tools
Chapter 1
Inference and Explanations

Explanations:
the series of inference steps

can be retraced
They increase users confidence in Semantic
Web agents: Oh yeah? button
Activities between agents: create or validate
proofs
39
Chapter 1
Typical Explanation Procedure

Facts
will typically be traced to some Web

addresses
The trust of the Web address will be verifiable by

agents
Rules
may be a part of a shared commerce

ontology or the policy of the online shop
40
Chapter 1
Software Agents
Software agents work autonomously and proactively
A personal agent on the Semantic Web will:
41
They evolved out of object oriented and compontent-based

programming
receive some tasks and preferences from the person
seek information from Web sources, communicate with
other agents
compare information about user requirements and
preferences, make certain choices
give answers to the user
Chapter 1
Intelligent Personal Agents
42
Chapter 1
Semantic Web Agent Technologies

Metadata
Identify and extract information from Web sources
Ontologies
Web searches, interpret retrieved information

Communicate with other agents
Logic
43
Process retrieved information, draw conclusions
Chapter 1
Semantic Web Agent Technologies (2)

Further
technologies (orthogonal to the

Semantic Web technologies)
44
Agent communication languages

Formal representation of beliefs, desires, and
intentions of agents
Creation and maintenance of user models.
Chapter 1
Lecture Outline
1.
2.
3.
4.
45
Todays Web
A Layered Approach
Chapter 1
A Layered Approach
The
development of the Semantic Web

proceeds in steps
Each step building a layer on top of another
Principles:
Downward compatibility
Upward partial understanding
46
Chapter 1
The Semantic Web Layer Tower
47
Chapter 1
An Alternative Layer Stack
48
Takes recent developments into account

The main differences are:
The ontology layer is instantiated with two alternatives: the
current standard Web ontology language, OWL, and a rulebased language
DLP is the intersection of OWL and Horn logic, and serves as a
common foundation
The Semantic Web Architecture is currently being

debated and may be subject to refinements and
modifications in the future.
Chapter 1
Alternative Semantic Web Stack
49
Chapter 1
Semantic Web Layers

XML
Syntactic basis
RDF
layer
layer
RDF basic data model for facts

RDF Schema simple ontology language
Ontology
50
layer
More expressive languages than RDF Schema

Current Web standard: OWL
Chapter 1
Semantic Web Layers (2)

Logic
enhance ontology languages further

application-specific declarative knowledge
Proof
51
layer
Proof generation, exchange, validation
Trust
layer
layer
Digital signatures
recommendations, rating agencies .
Chapter 1
Book Outline
2.
3.
4.
5.
6.
7.
8.
52
Structured Web Documents in XML

Describing Web Resources in RDF
Web Ontology Language: OWL
Logic and Inference: Rules
Applications
Ontology Engineering
Conclusion and Outlook
Chapter 1

The Semantic Web Vision: Grigoris Antoniou Frank Van Harmelen

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Chapter 1

The Semantic Web Vision

A Semantic Web Primer

A Semantic Web Primer

Most of todays Web content is suitable for human

Typical Web uses today peoples

Even Web content that is generated automatically from

A Semantic Web Primer

Keyword-Based Search Engines

Web activities are not particularly

Except for keyword-based search engines (e.g.

Web would not have been the huge

A Semantic Web Primer

recall, low precision.

A Semantic Web Primer

The Key Problem of Todays Web

meaning of Web content is not machineaccessible: lack of semantics

A Semantic Web Primer

The Semantic Web Approach

Web content in a form that is

A Semantic Web Primer

A Semantic Web Primer

The Semantic Web Impact

Knowledge management concerns itself with

A Semantic Web Primer

Limitations of Current Knowledge

inconsistencies in terminology, outdated information.

human involvement necessary for browsing, retrieving,

Keyword-based search engines

Impossible to define views on Web knowledge

A Semantic Web Primer

Semantic Web Enabled Knowledge

Knowledge will be organized in conceptual spaces

A Semantic Web Primer

The Semantic Web Impact

typical scenario: user visits one or several

A Semantic Web Primer

rely on wrappers: extensive

A Semantic Web Primer

Semantic Web Enabled B2C

agents that can interpret the

Pricing and product information, delivery and

about the reputation of shops

A Semantic Web Primer

The Semantic Web Impact

Isolated technology, understood only by experts

appears to be perfect infrastructure

But B2B not well supported by Web standards

A Semantic Web Primer

Semantic Web Enabled B2B Electronic

Businesses enter partnerships without much

A Semantic Web Primer

of web pages that allow users to

A Semantic Web Primer

Some Uses of Wikis

A Semantic Web Primer

Semantic Web Enabled Wikis

The inherent structure of a wiki, given by the linking