USGIN SKOS vocabulary service

Service to deliver term definitions and related terms

Use of SKOS for encoding vocabularies

Document Information
Profile Version: 
0.1.0
Type: 
Discussion Paper
Document ID: 
gin2010-007
Profile Document: 

Discussion and suggested guidelines for use of SKOS with science vocabulary, in the context of GeoSciML services. Draft for public comment.

CGI URN: urn:cgi:document:CGI:GeoSciML_SKOS_vocabulary:text:application%2Fmsword:2003

Discussion of Vocabulary service requirements

Document Information
Profile Version: 
0.1.0
Type: 
Discussion Paper
Document ID: 
gin2009-002

Knowledge is encoded in language. Concepts are represented by words in human language, and by tokens (bits!) in computer systems. These tokens are only meaningful as far as they can be correlated with words that users of the computer data can understand. Since different people use different words to represent the same concept, or the same word for different concepts, an interoperable information system needs a way to convey meaning for tokens representing concepts to users in different communities.

USGIN Vocabulary Service Profile Home

The primary operational functions of a vocabulary service are:

1) to assign meaning to a given term (i.e. a token that represents a concept)

2) to provide terms related to a queried term

To be useful in a computer information system, these functions must be accessible through machine readable interface.

In addition, a vocabulary service might provide a variety of maintenance or stewardship functions, but these might not operate through the same web interface as the definition and query functions because of access control issues.

Shared vocabularies require an authoritative registry for reference purposes.

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