A presentation on RVL given at the Herrenhäuser Symposium Visual Linguistics, Hannover, 20.11.2014. With RVL you can define mappings between relations in the data (RDF properties) to graphic relations (containment, color ...). We present the main principle and introduce and link to an initial prototype.

1. TU Dresden / SMT / Softwaretechnology Group
Presentation + Demo
Sharing and Reusing Visualizations
for the Web of Data with the
RDFS/OWL Visualization Language (RVL)
Jan Polowinski,
Herrenhäuser Symposium Visual Linguistics,
Hannover, 20.11.2014
jan.polowinski@tu-dresden.de
twitter: janpolowinski

2. Overall Goals and Further Thoughts
2/25
Visualization authors can
share and reuse „good“
visualization settings and
take their settings to other
tools!
Visualization
Author
Author of a domain ontology (just finished modelling)
Domain ontology authors can
propose visualization settings!
Mappings should
be consise and
declarative
then the Mappings
should be
composable!
The specifics of
RDFS and OWL
should be considered!

3. 3/25
1 – Overview on RVL
2 – Demo
3 – Feedback

4. 1 – Overview on RVL
RVL: A Language for RDFS/OWL Visualisation 4/25

5. Complete Example – Composed Mapping
5/25

6. Complete Example – Composed Mapping
RVL: A Language for RDFS/OWL Visualisation 6/25

7. Complete Example – Composed Mapping
7/25

8. Complete Example – Composed Mapping
8/25

9. !

10. !!#

11. Complete Example – Composed Mapping
RVL: A Language for RDFS/OWL Visualisation 9/25

12. Complete Example – Composed Mapping
10/25

13. 11/25
Modelling
Linking with
Roles

14. 12/25
Modelling Containment
with Roles

15. (De)Composing Graphics Using Syntactic Roles
A syntactic role is a role that a graphic object may play within
a syntactic structure. We distinguish [...] node, label,
connector, separator, container, point locator, line locator,
surface locator, volume locator, metric bar, and grid line.
• „Syntactic roles“ used by Engelhardt for analysis
• We try to use them for synthesis ( composition)
13/25
„
“ Engelhardt, 2002: „The Language of Graphics“. Institute for Logic, Language
Computation, University of Amsterdam.

16. 14/25
Engelhardt, von, Jörg. „The Language of Graphics“. Institute for Logic, Language Computation, University of
Amsterdam., 2002.

17. Last Slide!  à Live Demo (Visualizing Works of Tolkien)
15/25

18. Property Mappings
16/25

19. #

20. !

21. RVL: A Language for RDFS/OWL Visualisation

22. Value Mappings
• Simple case: 1-to-1 explicit,
manual mapping of discrete
values

23. 17/25

24. #

25. !

26. common-­‐shapes:
Star
common-­‐shapes:
Circle
common-­‐shapes:
Triangle
ex:EventClass
ex:Loca9onClass
ex:PersonClass
VALUE MAPPINGS PROPERTY M.

27. Value Mappings
• Simple case: 1-to-1 explicit,
manual mapping of discrete
values
• Calculated value mappings
• Default: map whole range of
source values to the whole range
of target values
• Source and target values can be
refined ...
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32. 18/25
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42. RVL – Main
Constructs
19/25

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63. Conclusion [WIP]
20/25

64. Conclusion [WIP]
21/25
Mappings should
be consise and
declarative
The specifics of
RDFS and OWL
should be considered!
Why not use Fresnel
or CSS? Do we need
more?
YES! But reuse.

65. Conclusion [WIP]
22/25
Visualization authors can
share and reuse „good“
visualization settings and
take their settings to other
tools!
Domain ontology authors can
propose visualization settings!
Mappings stored
just like the data
- in RDF.

66. Conclusion [WIP]
23/25
then the Mappings should be
composable!
?

67. 3 – Future Work
• Graph Transformation-based implementation
• Consider the experiences from Hypergraph approaches [Minas,
24/25
2000; Bardohl, 2000]
Future Work (for you - if you like)
• Reuse VISO!
• Look at the RVL Example-Suite
• http://www-st.inf.tu-dresden.de/semvis/blog/?page_id=287
• Fork RVL at github
• https://github.com/janpolowinski/rvl

68. Acknowledgements
• This research has been co-funded by the European Social Fond / Free State of Saxony,
contract no. 80937064 and 1330674013 (eScience – network).
• Example data for the demo has been prepared in the context of my work for the Saxony
State and University Library Dresden (SLUB)
25/26
BACKUP SLIDES à

69. Literature
• Engelhardt, von, Jörg. „The Language of Graphics“. Institute for Logic, Language
Computation, University of Amsterdam., 2002.
• Minas, „Hypergraphs as a uniform diagram representation model“, 2000.
• Bardohl, GENGED visual definition of visual languages: based on algebraic graph
transformation“, 2000.
• RVL: Visualization-Ontology: http://purl.org/rvl/
• Source: https://github.com/janpolowinski/rvl
• Wiki: https://github.com/semvis/rvl/wiki/
• Blog: http://www-st.inf.tu-dresden.de/semvis/blog/
• VISO Visualization-Ontology: http://purl.org/viso/graphic/
26/26
BACKUP SLIDES à

70. 3 – Feedback
[also look at the following backup slides for further
background information on RVL, VISO and the
usage context]
27/25

71. BACKUP SLIDES

72. OntoWiki-based Prototype for RVL editing, driven by RVL
constraints defined in SPIN
(MA thesis, Pooran Patel)
29/25

73. TopBraid Composer-based Prototype, driven by the same RVL
constraints defined in SPIN
(Jan Polowinski, 2010)
30/25

74. Context –
usage of RVL
as part of the
OGVIC
approach for
Ontology-driven
Guided
Visualisation
supporting
Composable
Mappings

75. Analysis preceeding the specification of RVL:
What‘s in the Data? What can we map?
32/25

76. Analysis II: Which Graphics Could be Built with the
New (Ontological) Data?
33/25

77. Graphic Attributes and Graphic-Object-to-Object-
Relations in the Visualization Ontology (VISO)
Graphic Attributes (GA)
• Lightness, Shape, Size, Named Colors
Graphic-Object-to-Object-
Relations (GOTOR)
• Linking Undirected
• Relative Position
• Separation by a Separator
à Formalised as
VISO Ontology
http://purl.org/viso/ 34/25

78. Calculation
of Value
Mappings
in RVL
35/25

79. Work of Minas and Bardohl on Hypergraphs and
GT in the field of diagrams and visual languages
36/25
„Hypergraphs as a
uniform diagram
representation model“
(Minas, 2000)
„GENGED visual
definition of visual
languages: based on
algebraic graph
transformation“
(Bardohl, 2000)
Minas, M. „Hypergraphs as a uniform diagram representation
model“. Theory and Application of Graph Transformations
(2000): 405–411.