Zepheira » David Wood

Migration of purlz.org

Thu, 29 Jul 2010 23:50:30 +0000

The PURL Open Source Software community site at purlz.org has been migrated from Zepheira’s servers to Google Code. Accordingly, the mailing lists hosted at purlz.org are also migrating to a Google Group.

The purlz.org DNS domain will redirect to the Google Code site. The new Google Group that replaces the mailing lists is: http://groups.google.com/group/persistenturls. Please subscribe!

Thanks for your patience and support as we transition the community infrastructure. We look forward to continuing to serve you and the PURL community.

RDF Next Step Workshop 2010

Wed, 23 Jun 2010 23:33:34 +0000

Zepheira will be presenting two papers at the W3C RDF Next Step Workshop on the future of RDF on June 26-27, 2010. The goal of the workshop is to gather feedback from the Semantic Web community on whether and in which direction RDF should evolve.

Zepheira will present a new RESTful RDF Store API supporting named queries and change isolation. Zepheira will also propose alternative handling of rdf:List in SPARQL. For more information on the workshop and to review the papers look here.

Callimachus Launch

Tue, 22 Jun 2010 23:30:33 +0000

Callimachus is a Semantic Web framework for easily building hyperlinked Web applications. Callimachus allows Web authors to quickly and easily create Semantically-enabled Web applications with a minimal knowledge of Semantic Web principles or experience building other Web applications. Callimachus uses RDFa as both a query language and display template to make it quick and easy to create your own metadata management tools.

For more information about Callimachus visit the project page at http://callimachusproject.org

Zepheira presents on Linked Data at Semantic Technology Conference 2010

Mon, 17 May 2010 17:50:23 +0000

SemTech 2010 is the premier semantic technologies event held in San Francisco CA June 21-25, 2010.SemTech 2010 is where the industry comes together for four days of tutorials, workshops and talks on the future of the Web. Sessions at SemTech 2010 will explain Linked Data (and Linked open Data) technologies, and how you can start to use them yourself. Please join Zepheira where David Wood and Bernadette Hyland will be leading a half day tutorial on Linked Enterprise Data on Tuesday, June 22, 2010.

Linked Data (or Linked Open Data) is an emerging set of concepts and technologies for combining and integrating data. This exciting branch of the semantic web is finding applications across government and industry and for a variety of applications from new web-based mashups and visualizations, to the pragmatic enterprise requirements for data extraction, integration and management. Linked data is a key component of both the UK and US government initiatives for greater transparency and citizen accountability.

Please also join us on “RDF Day” to learn more about “Extending and Querying RDF” on Friday, June 25, 2010. This presentation will be given by David Booth from Cleveland Clinic, David Wood and James Leigh from Zepheira.

For details on the speakers and talks, please see the SemTech2010 Agenda here.

Zepheira to Upgrade and Host US GPO PURLs

Wed, 21 Apr 2010 17:56:55 +0000

The U.S. Government Printing Office (GPO) has announced the development and hosting of new Persistent URL (PURL) architecture by Zepheira. GPO’s PURL service provides persistent Web addresses for critical government documents and is primarily used by the more than 1,200 Federal Depository Libraries. GPO PURLs are open to members of the public.

GPO’s public announcement listed several benefits of the contract to Zepheira, including upgrading the GPO PURL server to the PURLz software developed by Zepheira in conjunction with the Online Computer Library Center (OCLC) in 2008. PURLz is Open Source Software and managed by Zepheira in an open community environment.

The upgraded PURL infrastructure is expected to move into production use during Summer 2010.

PURL Federation Development Effort

Tue, 23 Mar 2010 18:33:48 +0000

The National Center for Biomedical Ontology and Zepheira are pleased to announce work on a PURL Federation. A PURL Federation will allow multiple PURL service operators to cooperate in PURL resolutions, covering for each other in the case of service outages and allowing the persistent resolution of PURLs as funding levels and organizational details change with time.

PURL Federations are intended to enhance the ability of Semantic Web and Linked Data communities to ensure the persistence of their identifiers.

Prototypes of the PURL Federation code will be released occasionally in the coming months, with an Alpha version to be released in the Summer of 2010. Further announcements of releases will be made on the purl...@purlz.org mailing list and on the PURLZ website.

The architecture document guiding the development of a PURL Federation is available at:

Review and feedback on the proposed architecture is encouraged.

RDF 2.0 Workshop

Tue, 08 Dec 2009 18:37:59 +0000

Zepheira Partner David Wood will co-chair a W3C Workshop on the future of RDF sometime in the summer of 2010 with Stefan Decker of DERI and Ivan Herman of the W3C. The goal of the workshop is to gather feedback from the Semantic Web community on whether and in which direction RDF should evolve. Participants will discuss a possible revision of the 2004 RDF Recommendation (tentatively called RDF 2.0).

The goal of the workshop is to gather feedback from the Semantic Web community on whether and in which direction RDF should evolve. The Workshop should help decide whether the W3C should start a new RDF Working Group to define and standardize a next version of RDF.

Anyone may participate in the workshop, but each participant will be required to submit a position paper beforehand. Requirements for position papers as well as dates and the location of the workshop will be provided as planning proceeds. The draft Call for Position Papers is available from the W3C Web site.

JES & Co. Expands the Achievement Standards Network

Mon, 07 Dec 2009 18:38:46 +0000

At the annual National Science Distributed Learning conference sponsored by the National Science Foundation (NSF), participants learned how JES & Co.’s Achievement Standards Network (ASN) framework is being used by Australia’s Curriculum Corporation in an effort to link educational resource data globally. Zepheira partner David Wood and contractor James Leigh worked with JES to develop a reusable, Open Source editor for Resource Description Framework content as a key portion of this work.

Zepheira combined the JES editor with the Alibaba RDF framework and the Mulgara Semantic Web database to produce a simple and extensible solutions stack for the creation of arbitrary Semantic Web applications. This solutions stack will be released as a new Open Source software project (see Zepheira’s pre-announcement here.

See the full JES & Co. press release for more details on the expansion of the Achievement Standards Network.

Zepheira Announces Callimachus, Semantic Web Apps Made Easy

Mon, 02 Nov 2009 16:41:24 +0000

Zepheira announces Callimachus, an Open Source Software project to allow Semantic Web applications to be easily made by Web authors. Callimachus builds on Mulgara (an established Semantic Web database), Ali Baba (an object-to-RDF mapping technology) and a new generalized, configurable RDF editor. The project will officially launch in December 2009. In the meantime, a slide show is available to preview Callimachus’ features.

Callimachus has been made possible by support from JES & Co., the National Science Foundation and Zepheira.

Zepheira Partners to Attend Dublin Core 2009 in Seoul

Wed, 14 Oct 2009 18:42:55 +0000

Zepheira partners Eric Miller and David Wood will be speaking at the Dublin Core 2009 Conference in Seoul, Republic of Korea 12-16 October 2009. Tim Berners Lee and Eric Miller will be speaking with Special session on strategic, policy and future issues for linked data. Eric Miller will also be presenting on Recollection, a project with the U.S. Library of Congress and the National Digital Information Infrastructure Partner Program (NDIIPP) designed to enhance discoverable access for NDIIPP collections, making them easier to find, access, and share, and especially to integrate with other digital information sources. Dr. Wood will be introducing Callimachus, a Zepheira project to make Semantic Web applications easier to create. Callimachus is funded by JES & Co. and the National Science Foundation.