Daniel Lewis

Reasons to use OpenLink Data Spaces (ODS)

There are quite a few reasons to use OpenLink Data Spaces (ODS). Here are 10 of the reasons why I use ODS:

1. Its native support of DataPortability Recommendations such as RSS, Atom, APML, Yadis, OPML, Microformats, FOAF, SIOC, OpenID and OAuth.
2. Its native support of Semantic Web Technologies such as: RDF and SPARQL/SPARUL for querying.
3. Everything in ODS is an Object with its own URI, this is due to the underlying Object-Relational Architecture provided by Virtuoso.
4. It has all the social media components that you could need, including: blogs, wikis, social networks, feed readers, CRM and a calendar.
5. It is expandable by installing pre-configured components (called VADs), or by re-configuring a LAMP application to use Virtuoso. Some examples of current VADs include: MediaWiki, Wordpress and Drupal.
6. It works with external webservices such as: Facebook, del.icio.us and Flickr.
7. Everything within OpenLink Data Spaces is Linked Data, which provides more meaningful information than just plain structural information. This meaningful information could be used for complex inferencing systems, as ODS can be seen as a Knowledge Base.
8. ODS builds bridges between the existing static-document based web (aka “Web 1.0“), the more dynamic, services-oriented, social and/or user-orientated webs (aka “Web 2.0“) and the web which we are just going into, which is more data-orientated (aka “Web 3.0” or “Linked Data Web”).
9. It is fully supportive of Cloud Computing, and can be installed on Amazon EC2.
10. Its released free under the GNU General Public License (GPL). [note]However, it is technically dual licensed as it lays on top of the OpenLink Virtuoso Universal Server which has both Commercial and GPL licensing[/note]

Human Links

• OpenLink Data Spaces (ODS)
• OpenLink Virtuoso
• OpenLink Software
• W3C Semantic Web
• DataPortability.org

Technorati Tags: openlink, dataspaces, ods, linkeddata, semanticweb, dataportability, web3.0

Categories: web 3.0 · semweb2 Comments

Had to have a blood test this morning. Was particularly painful this morning.

It was to test for Kidney Function and Cholesterol, so I had to fast… which was quite tough. Only one tube this time, whereas last time it was 5 tubes.

Daniel

Categories: PersonalNo Comments.

Hello,

I was at Oxford Geek Night 5 last night to announce BarCampOxford stuff, except I kinda messed it up:

(photo taken by Alex Blok of O’Wonder)

The messing up was probably due to a number of reasons:

• My co-organiser (Pete Cooper) not being there because of illness, and being told about that a couple of hours before the evening
• Not being able meeting someone else before the evening about a project, because she is currently ill
• I started taking Bisoprolol Fumarate (a beta-blocker) that day to treat my Dilated Cardiomyopathy
• Just not being prepared to do the announcements in that break

But oh well, as Alex Blok said to me last night:

You did fine. After all, if Bar Camp is supposed to be unprepared and chaotic, you just summed it up perfectly…

So, anyway. I have created some slides and a little video to show whats really going on with BarCampOxford:

• Slides: https://www.vanirsystems.com/barcampoxford/OGNPresentation.html
• Video: https://www.vanirsystems.com/barcampoxford/BarCampOxford.mov

Also go to the BarCampOxford website for more information.

Technorati Tags: oxfordgeeknight5, ogn5, oxford, geek, night, barcamp, barcampoxford

Categories: semweb · web 3.0 · web 2.0 · random · technological · Personal3 Comments

The many different ways to get data into Virtuoso:

[Warning]Contains quite technical information, its suggested that you know a little bit about the Semantic Web before you read. See the Semantic Web FAQ document for more information about the Semantic Web.[/Warning]

There are many different ways of getting data into Virtuoso, I’ll give you a more detailed run through but to get you started here is a list:

• RDF Sink Folders
• HTTP Put
• HTTP Post
• SPARQL Insert via /sparql endpoint
• SPARQL Insert via HTTP Post using Content-Type: application/sparql-query
• Using the Virtuoso Crawler
• Using a Sponger with a SPARQL Query
• Using Virtuoso PL APIs
• Using the SIMILE RDF Bank API
• Using RDF NET

[Read more →]

Categories: semwebNo Comments.

Data Spaces Philosophy: Why and How?

Data Spaces are the best way to look at user related/orientated data, and I am not just saying that because I work for OpenLink Software who invented OpenLink Data Spaces (ODS). I shall explain using diagrams that I created for explaining OpenLink Data Spaces.

The best way to visualise a Data Space is by imagine that you and your data are in a Solar System:

And your Solar System can build relationships with other Solar Systems, this can be:

• a contact/friend (foaf:knows)
• an identity which is really the same as you (owl:sameAs)
• or something else, such as a pointer to see something else (rdf:seeAlso)

You can start to picture that there are multiple solar systems in a galaxy and multiple galaxies in a universe - which is how we achieve congruency with the universe scale.

In this universe of relationships everything has its own name, just like in Stargate SG1 P3X-272 (coincidently a planet with a repository of knowledge), this name is the universal key, the Unique Identifier also known as a Uniform Resource Identifier (URI).

As you may have noticed, our solar system is made up of objects described in Resource Description Format (RDF):

It uses technologies which enable the Semantic Web Vision which was proposed by Berners-Lee, Hendler and Lassila in 2001 [1], and then extended by Shadbolt, Berners-Lee and Hall in 2006 [2]. A Data Space system is a bit like nature - everything is related somehow, this is achieved by making full use of Linked Data (which involves linking data across knowledge bases / domains of information to achieve semantics for human readers and machine readers). As you can see Linked Data is very useful within a system and across systems (e.g. across galaxies in our data space analogy). Kingsley Idehen and Michael Bergman have interesting blog posts about Linking Data titled “FOAF-ing Linked Data is quite SIOC-ing” and “Linked Data Comes of Age” respectively.

A Data Space will use vocabularies such as FOAF and SIOC to interconnect data:

Everything in a Data Space is accessible via a URI, and can be queried using a language such as SPARQL.

This is all available now through OpenLink Data Spaces which lays on top of OpenLink Virtuoso Universal Server, and I expect that this kind of Linked Data and Data Space philosophy will become more and more common over this year (2008).

{p.s. you may have noticed that this blog post is full of links, these are actually me manually Linking Open Data! By doing this I am actually expanding the Giant Global Graph. For some explicitly human readable references see below}

Human Links:

• [1] Tim Berners-Lee, James Hendler & Ora Lassila: “The Semantic Web“, Scientific American 284(5):34-43 (May 2001)
• [2] Nigel Shadbolt, Tim Berners-Lee and Wendy Hall “The Semantic Web Revisited.” IEEE Intelligent Systems, 21 (3). pp. 96-101. (2006) ISSN 1541-1672
• OpenLink Software
• OpenLink Data Spaces
• Kingsley Idehen - Blog
• Michael Bergman - Website
• RDF Project on the W3C Website
• FOAF (Friend of a Friend) Vocabulary - Website
• SIOC (Semantically Interconnected Online Communities) Vocabulary - Website
• SPARQL Specification
• Semantic Web Project on the W3C Website
• Linked Data Resources
• The Linking Open Data Project

Folksonomy Links:

Technorati Tags: dataspaces, openlink, linked, data, semanticweb, web30, web20, rdf, dataweb

Categories: web 3.0 · semweb1 Comment

Just a note to say that if you are in the Oxford area on the 6th February (2008) then please, please come to the Oxford Geek Night 5. Its at the Jericho Tavern Pub in Oxford and starts at 7:30pm. It features a bit of socialising, a bit of watching presentations and some fun.

If you do come then please come and say hello

Many thanks,

Daniel

Links:

• Oxford Geek Night 5
  

Technorati Tags: oxford, geek, night, oxfordgeeknight, ogn5, jerichotavern, jericho

Categories: web 3.0 · AI · databases · programming · semweb · web 2.0 · academic · technological · functionalprogramming · hardwareNo Comments.

After a brief IRC discussion with Danny Ayers and his blog post “Easy microformat authoring“. I decided to take it upon myself to create a CSS file with all of the hCard (Microformats) properties, and so here it is: hcard.css

You can use it as a template for when you want to give your hCard data some style, or you can use it in Amaya Web Editor to autogenerate class names ready for “Easy microformat authoring”.

If anyone spots anything wrong with the file then do let me know and I’ll modify it.

Thank you,

Daniel

Links

• Amaya Web Editor/Browser
• hCard Specification and Cheatsheet
• My hCard CSS File Template
• Microformats Home Page

Technorati Tags: microformats, hcard, amaya, semanticweb, authoring, easy

Categories: semwebNo Comments.

Today has been one of those days which you get when you are in the computing industry, you go to do one thing and you can’t because there is something in the way. Its happened so many times, quite disruptive.

Daniel

Categories: PersonalNo Comments.

Hi all,

I’ve been a bit out of it this week because of finding out about the Dilated Cardiomyopathy, but I’m getting back on track, catching up with a lot of work. I’ve also been doing a lot of walks, during some of these walks I have been pondering Philosophy… some of the things I have been thinking about include:

• my own definition of what the Soul is, and how it fits in with Mind-Body-Spirit philosophy
• being a wisdom seeker, what wisdom is made from, and how an Intelligent Agent would achieve wisdom
• collective consciousness and if/how it fits into the modern major religions
• being Christian and achieving Christian Unity
• mysticism, pluralism and universalism
• the relationship between population and technology advancement

I am currently developing an interesting tutorial which covers Virtuoso, SPARQL, MediaWiki, Wikipedia and Linked Data. This will be coming soon.

Just a short post right now, I’m sure you’ll get a longer one soon!

Daniel

Categories: PersonalNo Comments.

I have been mulling over whether to make this post or not, and I decided that I will, so here we are.

I had to go to hospital yesterday for various scans to check whether I had something or not (I’ll get onto this “something” in a minute). My mother and sister were both diagnosed with it a few months ago, and it was recommended that I get checked, so I did. Its rather unfortunate to say that I have got this “something”.

What is this something?

This something is Familial Dilated Cardiomyopathy.

Dilated cardiomyopathy (DCM) is a disease of the heart muscle that causes the heart to become enlarged and to pump less strongly

{image and quote are from The Cardiomyopathy Association website: cardiomyopathy.org (a registered charity)}

Luckily, my heart is not as severe as it could be and I will be going onto long-term medication to help my heart. I don’t exhibit any major symptoms, but it is clear that I have it from my irregular pulse, and by looking at the Echocardiogram results.

Treatment & Care

• I will soon be taking an ACE Inhibitor and mild Beta-Blocker daily. (Doctor recommendation)
• I will need to get a bit more fit, but without doing very stressful exercise. I’ll probably do more yoga at home, and continue doing as much walking as I can. (Probably good thing, which I have needed to do for a long time)
• I will be making sure that I do meditation and giving myself Reiki Self-Treatments. (My own recommendation)
• Taking CoQ10 (a.k.a. Coenzyme Q10) daily. (My own recommendation, based on research into Complementary Therapy)
• Keep a low alcohol consumption. Reduce Caffeine in-take. Continue to not take drugs and not smoke.

Familial

The familial part means that it is a genetic/inherited thing. There is around a 50% chance that a child of a Familial Dilated Cardiomyopathy sufferer will also have Familial Dilated Cardiomyopathy.

More details (Links)

• The Cardiomyopathy Association (Charity): https://www.cardiomyopathy.org/
• Dilated Cardiomyopathy on Patient UK: https://www.patient.co.uk/showdoc/27000294/
• Dilated Cardiomyopathy on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dilated_cardiomyopathy

Technorati Tags: dilated, cardiomyopathy, dcm, heart, familial, genetic

(p.s. I mentioned Reiki… I’ll be looking to do a Reiki Level 2 course some point soon, because I feel that it is a beneficial meditation/relaxation/healing technique)

Categories: Personal1 Comment