=Paper=
{{Paper
|id=Vol-494/paper-17
|storemode=property
|title=SIOC Project: Semantically Interlinked Online Communities
|pdfUrl=https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-494/coinpaper8.pdf
|volume=Vol-494
|dblpUrl=https://dblp.org/rec/conf/mallow/BojarsP09
}}
==SIOC Project: Semantically Interlinked Online Communities==
https://ceur-ws.org/Vol-494/coinpaper8.pdf
The SIOC Project: Semantically-Interlinked Online
Communities
Uldis Bojārs and Alexandre Passant and John G. Breslin and Stefan Decker
Digital Enterprise Research Institute,
National University of Ireland, Galway, Ireland.
Email: [uldis.bojars,alexandre.passant,john.breslin,stefan.decker]@deri.org
Abstract—The SIOC project is aimed at expressing information by Users. The following example then describes that Alice
about the structure and content of online community sites and has created a post in a particular forum (i.e. an area of
at enabling interoperability on the Social Web using Semantic discussion) and that Bob replied to it — as follows (using the
Web technologies. In this paper we briefly describe the SIOC
project, introduce the SIOC Core ontology and its modules, and N3 notation - prefixes omitted). In order to represent more
discuss some SIOC-based applications in terms of human and abstract containers (such as a personal information space),
agent communication. more general Container and Space classes can be used.
I. I NTRODUCTION :post a sioc:Post ;
While new paradigms, tools and web services introduced sioc:has_creator :alice ;
by the Social Web (such as blogs, wikis, tagging practices) sioc:has_container :forum ;
are now widely accepted in both public and scientific com- sioc:has_reply :reply .
munities, these tools generally act as independent data silos; :forum a sioc:Forum .
hence, interoperability between applications is a complex :reply a sioc:Post ;
issue. The SIOC project1 aims at solving this by providing sioc:has_creator :bob .
a comprehensive data model (as well as related tools and :alice a sioc:User .
applications) based on Semantic Web technologies [1] in order :bob a sioc:User .
to represent online communities and their activities in an
homogenous way.
The SIOC project consists of two main parts:
• The SIOC Ontology, composed of a Core ontology and
different modules;
• A set of applications, for both producing and consuming
SIOC data, constantly evolving based on the user needs
and implementations.
II. T HE SIOC O NTOLOGY
The SIOC Ontology is composed of a Core ontology and a
set of modules, focusing on the ease of integration of SIOC
in existing applications by Web developers. With an emphasis
on standard Semantic Web technologies since its beginning,
the whole ontology has been designed using RDF(S)/OWL.
A comprehensive overview of the SIOC ontology is provided Fig. 1. Main classes and properties in the SIOC ontology.
in [2].
A. SIOC Core Ontology Other properties and classes exist in the ontology, for
2 instance properties to represent previous and next versions of
Main classes and properties in the SIOC ontology are
an item, which can be used when representing Wikis.
shown in Figure 1. While relatively small and simple, this
It is worth noticing that each sioc:User is actually
model is yet powerful enough to represent the content pro-
related to the Agent class (from the FOAF3 — Friend Of
duced and exchanged within online communities. For instance,
A Friend [3] — ontology), and that sioc:User can be
a Forum represents a space in which discussion happen (not
consequently associated with both software agents and human
necessarily a bulletin board, in spite of its name, but for
users. Hence, SIOC can be used to represent communication
example as a weblog), and contains different Posts, written
between bots on the Social Web (e.g. on IRC using the
1 http://sioc-project.org
2 http://rdfs.org/sioc/spec 3 http://foaf-project.org
F4(-.1%!04.&7)=%F88GG.%H.1'38I=%!',2.&%J,0G,3
"&'3(780'/(& 012. $+'%'6)4+"1'/$,:'%1'%##"31,'
!"#$%&'()*$%'+$,)+'-such as blog+.'/$0$+'
subClassOf has_scope
"1'%'#"((31$,7'+$,)<'T+)4+'
Space Site Role
%1*'23&&),$1'2"%4*+5'%4)'6&%7$18'%1' #4)%,)'U"+,+'%1*'%4)'#"11)#,)*'
$(6"4,%1, 4"&)'$1'0))6$18'6)"6&)'
has_space has_parent has_host has_function
,"'",:)4'3+)4+',:)7'01"/<
SIOC-IRClog project4$19"4()*'%1*'9%#$&$,%,$18'
) and then enable a machine-readable Container data being indexed by SearchMonkey3!1# to improve presentation
$+'%1'%4,$#&)'"4'()++%8)'
Forum User
#"((31$#%,$"1'"1',:)';)2<'=>)47'*%7'
description of communities of agents interacting together on of search subClassOfresults) and by various best 6"+,)*'27'%'T+)4',"'%'O"43(<'
practices documents
&%48)'%("31,+'"9'$19"4(%,$"1'%4)' has_container has_container has_member U"+,+'(%7'2)',:4)%*)*<
social websites. Moreover, another link between FOAF and describing
subClassOf data publishing on the Semantic Web such as [5].
2)$18'#4)%,)*'27'3+)4+'"9',:)+)'+$,)+<
SIOC is that the social networking aspect can be represented ItemVarious SIOC-enabled Post Usergroup 4!.5/
applications have $+'%'*$+#3++$"1'%4)%'"1'
been created10 ,
has_creator
?"/)>)4.'currently these +$,)+'%4)' /:$#:'U"+,+'"4')1,4$)+'%4)'(%*)<
using FOAF (by foaf:knows), while SIOC can be used to forming
+$($&%4',"'$+&%1*+'/:)4)'%&&',:)' a food-chain
has_reply topic (Figure 2) that includes data exporters
6-#2 $+'%1'"1&$1)'#"((31$,7'"4'
represent aspects of relationships inside the community, e.g. for Web 2.0 platforms
$1,)4%#,$"1':%66)1+'/$,:',:)'+$,)'%1*' and services (e.g. Drupal11 , WordPress,
Topic +),'"9'#"((31$,$)+<
there is little interlinking /$,:'4)&)>%1,'
a user following another (on microblogging services) can be Flickr, etc.), tools for indexing of distributed data, and browser
#"1>)4+%,$"1+'%1*'#"1,)1, )&+)/:)4)<' +,17.28$& 64"6)4,7'#"11)#,+'
expressed by the sioc:follows property. and visualization applications, allowing
S%$1'#&%++)+'%1*'64"6)4,$)+'$1',:)'!EFD'F1,"&"87 users to consume
U"+,+',"'",:)4'#"(()1,+'"4'
@:)4)'$+'%'1))*',"'$1,)4&$10'+"#$%&' SIOC data from various sources in an6"+,+'/:$#:'4)6&7',"',:)(< integrated way.
B. SIOC Modules ()*$%'#"1>)4+%,$"1+'%1*'%'1))*'9"4'
$19"4(%,$"1')A#:%18)'9"4(%,',:%,'
B3(780,31 $()),0'(31 $(&18-,31
Several SIOC modules%&&"/+',"'4)64)+)1,'%&&'$(6"4,%1,'
have been defined to extend the
*),%$&+'"9'+3#:'#"1>)4+%,$"1+<
available terms and to avoid making the SIOC Core Ontology Add-Ons and Fns SIOC Crawlers RDF Browsers
too complex and unreadable. SIOC has 4 ontology modules: for Exporting SIOC and Aggregate and Other Custom
from Existing Apps Storage of Data SIOC Explorers
Access, Argumentation, Services and Types5 .
#83%@II3(.04
SIOC from Semi- Indexers of SIOC Detectors
• the Access module B defines
C)>)&"6'%1'!"#!$!%&
simple classes "9',)4(+'9"4'
and properties Structured Data SIOC Instances and Clipping
or Queryable APIs w/o Full Storage Applications
regarding the notions4)64)+)1,$18'4$#:'*%,%'94"(',:)'
of Role and Permission to represent
!"#$%&';)2
access rights and permissions in online communities
B D4)%,)'%''!!()*+,-" "9'%66&$#%,$"1+' Applications with Reuse and Import
websites; Native Storage of for Data Portability
9"4'64"*3#$18.'#"&&)#,$18'%1*' SIOC Data Requirements
• the Argument module defines classes and properties
#"1+3($18'!EFD'*%,%
to represent simple argumentative discussions in online Bypassing Apps by Graphical Viz of
B C$++)($1%,) -"'!./,#-!")%2"3,' Directly Mapping
C((7%$4./&
(2%@II)/0.'/(&1
Derived SIOC
communities websites. RDBMS to SIOC Networks
!EFD'>$%'6%6)4+.',3,"4$%&+.
• the Services module *"#3()1,%,$"1'%1*')A%(6&)+
defines classes and properties to
reprsent Web services related to online communities (e.g. @:)'!EFD'%66&$#%,$"1'9""*'#:%$1
API endpoint and return format, etc.); Fig. 2. The SIOC food-chain
• the Types module !"#$%#&'()(*+
defines advanced content-types to be >1.*,%.&7%@II)/0.'/(&1 "&2(3-.'/(&%.6(8'%!"#$
SIOCuser-generated
used when defining ontology is an open data format
content from foronline- !EFD'"1,"&"87'$+'4%10)*'V,:'%1*'
IV. C ONCLUSION@3,"4$%&+'%,';;;'GHHI'%1*'!)(@)#:'
communities. Fordescribing
instance,structure and content
it includes of social
classes such as !EFD'@76)+'("*3&)'L K,:'$1'KHH' GHHI'-36#"($185'#"19)4)1#)+<
media sites in RDF. In this paper, we briefly introduced
"1,"&"8$)+'%,'U@!;<'S"4)',:%1' the SIOC project, its
!"#$%&'C%,%'"1',:)';)2'-!C";'GHHI5'
sioct:BlogPostor sioct:Wiki that respectively QHH',:"3+%1*'!EFD'*"#3()1,+'
SIOC follows best practices of the goals and means as well as uptake and/"40+:"6'%,'E!;D'GHHI'-36#"($185<
services overview. In
subclass the sioc:Postand sioc:Forumclasses from $1*)A)*'27'U@!;.'%4"31*'
Semantic Web by reusing existing particular, in the context of multi-agent systems and online
JGK'!EFDL4)&%,)*'632&$#%,$"1+'94"('
the Core Ontology;
ontologies: Dublin Core, FOAF, SKOS. VR',:"3+%1*':$,+'"1'!/""8&)<
communities, an already active fieldsC=ME'$1',:)'N"341%&'"9';)2'
for several years if we
In addition, one ofModularised
the recentdesign
development
allows us toofkeep
SIOC
the is a !EFD'C)>)&"6)4+'&$+,W'GHH'()(2)4+' !)(%1,$#+.'E==='E1,)&&$8)1,'!7+,)(+.'
consider for instance [6], the SIOC ontology
%1*'XHH'6"+,+ could be used to
E==='E1,)41),'D"(63,$18.'=34"6)%1'
SIOC Core
module defining alignments ontology SIOC
between simple and
andeasy
thetoSWAN
understand while ensuring extensibility.
express in a unified way information!)(%1,$#';)2'D"19)4)1#).'),#<
• JVH'%66&$#%,$"1+'%1*'+)4>$#)+'
about activities of both
— Semantic Web Applications in Neuromedicine — ontology humans and agents interacting in these communities.
3+$18'%1*'64"*3#$18'!EFD'*%,%
6 W3C Member
[4] , providing a complete model Submission of the SIOC
for fine-grained argumenta- @0G&(K),7*,-,&'1
Ontology published in July 2007. • YGH'%66&$#%,$"1+'9"4'!"#$%&'()
tive discussions in online scientific communities. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
!EFD'*%,%'94"('2&"8+.'9"43(+.' @:$+'/"40':%+'2))1'931*)*'27'
(%$&$18'&$+,+'%1*';)2'G%.'
•Science 84%1,'13(2)4'!OEPHGPD=QPEQRQ.
Foundation Ireland under Grant No. SFI/08/CE/I1380
M327'"1'M%$&+
(Lı́on-2).
Since the goal of SIOC is to provide interoperability be-
tween communities on the Social Web, one way to evaluate R EFERENCES
!"#$%&'()*+'%, -++./00)*12,.314'2+51360
its success is to consider its uptake on the Web. To illustrate
[1] T. Berners-Lee, J. A. Hendler, and O. Lassila, “The Semantic Web,”
the amount of SIOC data on the Web, according to the Scientific American, vol. 284, no. 5, pp. 34–43, 2001.
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SIOC is now widely accepted as a core ontology to describe http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/. [Online]. Available: http://xmlns.com/foaf/0.1/
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8 The full amount of SIOC information on the Web is larger than described
here as PTSW indexes only a part of available RDF data. 10 http://rdfs.org/sioc/applications/
9 http://developer.yahoo.com/searchmonkey/smguide/profile vocab.html 11 http://drupal.org/project/sioc