Semantic ENrichment Enabling Sustainability of arCHAeological Links (SENESCHAL)

Advisory guidelines on archaeological data entry encourage use of controlled vocabulary but the means to achieve this are lacking. Many datasets simply have free text descriptions. Other databases employ pick lists based on major thesauri but the output is still text rather than any standard ID that other databases will employ. Links to online thesauri exist with some web based data entry systems but free text entry inevitably leads to errors of various kinds. Controlled vocabularies are not readily available in standard semantic formats and easy means to provide controlled indexing are not generally available. Data providers lack an efficient way to provide uniquely identified controlled indexing of data that is compatible with semantic technologies and standards.

Knowledge Exchange (KE) activities based on enhanced vocabulary services are the focus of the proposed work. The general aim is to provide the means to encourage, but not force, data providers to use controlled types, by providing services to do this easily, together with tools for retrospective enrichment of existing datasets.

The work follows on from the STAR project that developed web services and user interface widgets that will be adapted and extended to meet the user needs described in this proposal. The services and KE activities will make it significantly easier for data providers to index their data with uniquely identified (machine readable) controlled terminology - ie semantically enriched and compatible with Linked Data. A further aim is to make it easier for vocabulary providers to make their vocabularies available in this format.

The project builds on the STAR/STELLAR collaboration between University of Glamorgan Hypermedia Research Unit and the Archaeology Data Service (ADS), with ADS playing a dual role as co-Investigators and users of the project outcomes. The work is in collaboration with project partners, English Heritage, who act as both vocabulary providers and users of the linked data creation and semantic enrichment services, together with RCAHMS and RCAHMW, in their role as national vocabulary standards setting bodies. Wessex Archaeology Ltd. and the Bespoke HER User Group join through their association as heritage data managers, data providers to Local Authorities and users of ADS resources.

The project will employ three major vocabulary resources maintained by EH as exemplars - the Monument Types Thesaurus, the Event Types Thesaurus and the MIDAS Archaeological Periods List. These resources will be converted to standard machine readable data formats and made freely available under a suitable open licensing arrangement. It is anticipated that converting these resources into standard linked data format with unique identifiers will encourage wider use of controlled terminology by archaeology users and act as exemplar for the wider cultural heritage domain. RESTful web services will be developed for the project to make the vocabulary resources programmatically accessible and searchable. These will include provision to 'feed back' new terms (concepts) suggested by users.

Summary of the main anticipated outcomes:
- Freely accessible and reusable persistent vocabulary resources as linked data, the techniques to achieve this being made freely available
- Web Services to SKOS representations of the vocabularies and semantic enrichment services, along with web application components
- Knowledge exchange for semi-automatic tools (using the services) to facilitate retrospective semantic alignment of existing datasets
- Knowledge exchange for tools to facilitate semantic enrichment (via URIs) within data entry
- Mechanism for feedback of supplementary terms to augment existing vocabularies
- The software developed will be available as open source.

The main aim of the FOF funding scheme is knowledge exchange (KE) to support innovative and creative engagements with new audiences beyond academia. Thus the proposed work is very closely concerned with pathways to impact.

The problems that hinder the creation and the use of uniquely identifiable (linked) data vocabulary resources are widespread across different sectors. Data providers lack an easy means to provide uniquely identified controlled indexing of data that is compatible with semantic technologies and standards, such as linked data and SKOS. Currently thesauri are not fully part of the workflow for user indexing and search.

The list of collaborators demonstrates the wide scope of the work's impact, including the national Archaeology Data Service (ADS), English Heritage together with RCAHMS and RCAHMW, Bespoke HER User Group (BHER) and a major commercial archaeology unit (Wessex).

An obvious group that will benefit is the ADS user community. This comprises a broad range of users, including National and local government archaeologists and cultural heritage managers, museums and commercial archaeologists and members of the public (as well as HE). The project's results will be immediately useful to significant infrastructure services, such as the FISH Toolkit and OASIS.

Project partners, English Heritage together with RCAHMS and RCAHMW, will be enabled to make vocabulary resources available as Linked Data facilitating wider use, the techniques to achieve this being made freely available. Project outcomes are directly applicable to applications such as the Heritage Gateway, while the resulting infrastucture improvements are broadly relevant to the National Heritage Protection Plan. Persistent vocabulary resources would be readily reusable across the domain.

The outcomes would be useful for other sectors more generally (HERs, national and local government curators, commercial bodies, museums). This will deliver significant benefit beyond HE, including third sector and commercial, as shown by the new audiences represented by project partners, the HER community and Wessex Archaeology Ltd., in addition to the wider national audiences represented by RCAHMS /W. The partners together with ADS, as standards and practice influencing bodies, are well placed to disseminate the outcomes of the feasibility studies to their respective sectors.

Controlled vocabularies have the potential to act as hubs in the emerging Web of Data; the methods, guidelines and experience will be of benefit to the ongoing efforts in Linked Data by government and others associated with the open data approach. The enhanced linking of archaeological data will promote its integration into the broader semantic web, breaking down subject domain barriers as well as barriers between academic, commercial and government based archaeological practice.

Cross-fertilisation is likely with various European and transatlantic projects the project team are involved in, such as TAG: Transatlantic Archaeological Gateway, ESFRI DARIAH (ARENA2), CARARE (Europeana), Digging into Metadata.

The project will provide technical tools and also lead to new working practices for controlled metadata. The feasibility studies will serve as a vehicle for KE and dissemination, together with the two project workshops. In addition, the ADS and Glamorgan will engage in the dissemination activities outlined in the proposal. ADS engages in a series of regular dissemination activities under the direction of its Deputy Director (Access) (the Co-I). These activities include newsletters, RSS, twitter, blogs and other social media and the utilisation of email lists ( c.1000 subscribers). The project team regularly presents at national and international conferences and engages in an extensive programme of visits and guest lectures, all of which offer opportunities to disseminate project outputs.