Annotating Scholarly Resources

Annotating Scholarly Resources

An Update from the Open 
AnnotaHon CollaboraHon 

h"p://www.openannota-on.org/ 

Robert Sanderson               rsanderson@lanl.gov 
                                            azaroth42@gmail.com 
Herbert Van de Sompel         herbertv@lanl.gov 
                                              hvdsomp@gmail.com 
Tim Cole                                 t‐cole3@illinois.edu 
Jane Hunter                         jane@itee.uq.edu.au     

           This research was funded by the Andrew W. Mellon FoundaHon.   
Acknowledgements:   Anna Gerber, Tom Habing, Bernhard Haslhofer,  Ray Larson, Cliﬀ Lynch,  
   Michael Nelson, Doug Reside 

Annotating Scholarly Resources: An Update from OAC 1
Robert Sanderson, Herbert Van de Sompel, Tim Cole, Jane Hunter

Overview

•  Introduction to the Open Annotation Collaboration

•  OAC Data Model
•  OAC Transfer Model

•  Phase 2 Work in 2011


Open Annotation Collaboration
•  Project Partners:

•  Los Alamos National Laboratory
•  University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign
•  University of Queensland
•  University of Maryland
•  George Mason University

•  Funding: Andrew W. Mellon Foundation

•  Discussion Group:

http://groups.google.com/group/oac-discuss


Current Scholarly Annotation
•  Annotations stuck in silos:
•  Only consumable by client that created it
•  Many clients offline/single user only
•  Annotations not shareable beyond original environment:
can not create cross system services based on (enriched &
merged) annotations

•  Online Annotations are Repository-centric, not Web-centric;
•  Identification in terms of local identifiers, not global URIs
•  Annotations stored in repository along with annotated content
•  Need to rethink in terms of the Web


Interoperability via OAC
•  Focus on interoperability for annotations in order to allow sharing of
annotations across:
•  Annotation clients
•  Content collections
•  Services that leverage annotations

•  Interoperability is at the data model level, not protocol level

•  Focus on annotation for scholarly purposes. But desire to make the
OAC framework more broadly usable.
•  In order to gain adoption, we need tools, communities, integration
of scholarly communication with other areas of discourse.


OAC Data Model

•  Attempts to be comprehensive
•  Research into existing applications
•  Real world use cases
•  Validated and refined via experiments

•  Changes for latest version from community feedback:
•  Identifiers for resource segments to enable use in RDF
•  Annotation is a document

•  Your continued feedback is very welcome!


Basic Model
•  The basic model has three resources:
•  Annotation (an RDF document)
•  Default: RDF/XML but others possible
•  Body (the content of the annotation, in any format)
•  Target (the resource the body is about, in any format)


Basic Model Example


Additional Relationships and Properties
•  Any of the resources can have additional information attached

•  Links can be added to further clarify relationships


Additional Relationships and Properties Example


Annotation Types
•  The type of the Annotation can be made more precise
•  Communities can develop their own types for their requirements
•  Example: Replies are Annotations on Annotations


Annotation Types Example


Inline Information

•  It is important to be able to have content contained within the
Annotation document.

•  Clients may be unable to mint new URIs for every resource
•  Clients may wish to transmit only a single document
•  Third parties can generate new URIs even if the client cannot

•  The W3C has a Content in RDF specification for this:
•  http://www.w3.org/TR/Content-in-RDF10/


Inline Body
•  We introduce a resource identified by a non resolvable URI, such
as a UUID URN, as the Body.
•  The data is embedded within the Annotation document using the
'chars' property from the Content in RDF ontology.


Inline Body Example


Multiple Targets
•  There are many use cases for multiple targets for an Annotation:
•  Comparison between two or more resources
•  Making a statement that applies to multiple resources
•  Making a statement about multiple parts of a resource
•  …

•  The OAC Data Model allows for multiple targets by simply having
more than one hasTarget relationship.


Multiple Targets Example


Segments of Resources
•  Most annotations are about part of a resource

•  Different types of segment for different media types:
•  Text: paragraph, arbitrary span of words
•  Image: rectangular or arbitrary shaped area
•  Audio: start and end time points
•  Video: both area and time
•  Other: slice of a data set, volume in a 3d object, …

•  We introduce a method of constraining resources:
•  Can be applied to either Body or Target resource
•  Use media-specific fragment identifiers; eg XPointer for XML
•  Use W3C Media Fragments for segments of image/audio/video:
http://www.w3.org/TR/media-frags/
•  Introduce an approach for arbitrarily complex segments


Segments of Resources: Fragment URIs
•  The Fragment part of URIs allows the creation of subsidiary URIs
that identify part of the main resource
•  eg: http://www.example.org/page.html#para1

•  The syntax is defined for several media types:
•  X/HTML: named anchor or identified element
•  XML: XPointer to the element
•  PDF: page number and rectangular area within
•  Plain Text: character position or line position

•  For all types of Fragment URI, the Annotation must also create a
dcterms:isPartOf link to the full resource for discovery purposes


Segments of Resources: Media Fragments
•  Media Fragments allow anyone to create URIs that identify part
of an image, audio or video resource.

•  The most common use case is for rectangular areas of images:
•  http://www.example.org/image.jpg#xywh=50,100,640,480


Media Fragments Example


Complex Constraints
•  We introduce a ConstrainedTarget resource that identifies the
resource with constraints applied to it in order to fully identify the target
of the Annotation
•  Constraint resource describes how target resource is being used in
the context of the Annotation

•  The type of description is
dependent on the nature of
the target resource

•  Different clients may
support different types of
description


Complex Constraints Example


Inline Constraints
•  We can also use inline information in the same way as for the Body
resource to include the Constraint data.


RDF Constraints
•  The information could instead be linked to the Constraint, within the
Annotation document.


Constrained Body
•  The Body may also be constrained in the same way as Targets


Web-Centric Annotation: Information Changes

Google Sidewiki Annotation on http://news.bbc.co.uk/ as of 2010-06-14

Web-Centric Annotation: Past Not Integrated

Archived page from:
http://www.dracos.co.uk/work/bbc-news-archive/2010/03/08/07.05.html

Web-Centric Annotation: Desired Integration


Uniform Annotations
•  If a single point in time is applicable to all resources, we attach it
to the Annotation using the oac:when predicate

•  This timestamp can be used to discover appropriate, archived
copies of the resources


Varied Annotations
•  If different timestamps are required for each resource, we use
oac:when from an oac:TimeConstraint.


Serialization of the Data Model
•  All of the nodes in the data model require URIs as identifiers
•  HTTP URIs are always preferred
•  Dereferencing the URI of the Annotation should return a description,
following Linked Data principles
•  UUID URNs are a good alternative for clients that cannot generate their
own HTTP URIs

•  Servers that find a UUID can replace it with an HTTP URI they
control, and serve the information from it
•  The server must also retain the original UUID and assert that it is the
same as the new HTTP URI
•  This allows for deduplication, when the client's original UUID is
discovered by multiple servers independently


Network Model: No Protocol, Just HTTP
•  The client stores the Annotation document
in at least one online system
•  It is just a document / web resource
•  No special protocol necessary

•  An Annotation service accesses it:
•  Using regular harvesting techniques
•  Upon request of a client
•  By being one of the places the client
sends the annotation to

•  Access control uses existing mechanisms

•  Plan to refine model in Phase 2


OAC Phase 2
•  Aim: Will focus on Deployment and Refinement

•  Attempt to fully engage with scholars requirements and work with
early adopters to help deploy implementations

•  Use those experiences to further refine the model, as needed, to
cover missing functionality

•  Approach is to execute multiple small scale experiments in
conjunction with new collaborators

•  Dates: January 2011 through Spring 2012


Phase 2: Initial New Collaborators
•  4 pre-selected experiments to start immediately:

•  Stanford University
Using Annotations to transcribe medieval manuscripts

•  AustLit
Using Annotations to support collaborative scholarly editions

•  Alexander Street Press
Annotation of streaming video

•  Herzog August Bibliothek & University of Illinois
Annotation of digital emblem books at multiple FRBR levels


Phase 2: Additional Experiments RFP
•  4 further experiments to be selected from an RFP:

•  $30-45k per experiment from June '11 to May '12

•  At least one partner from OAC will play an active role in each
selected experiment to ensure the value of feedback, and to
assist with modeling and questions

•  Scholarly use cases that exercise the model in interesting ways
will be favored. The use cases should:
•  Have existing content collection(s)
•  Already be web based via persistent URIs
•  Have an established scholarly audience of annotators
•  Demonstrate the benefits of a Web based scholarly
annotation system


Phase 2: Using OAC Workshop
•  OAC will host a funded workshop March 24, 25 in Chicago:

•  Aim: provide attendees with an in depth introduction to using
and implementing OAC
•  Up to 20 attendees will be selected based upon the submission
of a 1-2 page description of a relevant use case
•  At the workshop, attendees will evaluate the applicability of the
OAC data model to their submitted use case
•  Accommodation and up to $900 towards flights will be provided

•  Participation in the workshop IS NOT required for responding to
the RFP, but is likely to be useful


Phase 2: Dates of Note

•  01 Dec 2010: Call for Workshop Participation issued
•  17 Jan 2011: Preliminary Use Case briefs due
•  07 Feb 2011: Invitations issued
•  01 Mar 2011: Final Use Cases due from attendees
•  24 Mar 2011: Workshop
•  April 2011: RFPs due
•  May 2011: Additional experiments selected
•  June 2011: Beginning of Experiments
•  May 2012: End of Phase 2


http://www.openannotation.org/


Annotating Scholarly Resources

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