A few additions to Schema.org could foster the publishing of data about complex products such as new cars. Presentation at EC-WEB 2014

1. Automotive ranges as e-commerce data
EC-WEB - Munich - September 2, 2014
François-Paul Servant, François Jurain, Edouard Chevalier
{francois-paul.servant,francois.jurain,edouard.chevalier}@renault.com
EC-WEB 2014

2. EC-WEB 2014
Rich data for web marketing is cool,
but how do you publish data about1020 Renault cars*?
*Yes, 100 billions of billions, for sale right now

3. 01 Publishing descriptions of customizable products is possible
02
03
EC-WEB 2014
Search Engines can effectively index these data
Extension to Schema.org proposal

4. Product ranges in the automotive industry are huge
Body styles x Engines x Gearboxes
EC-WEB 2014
x Colors
x Air Conditioning systems
x Radios
x Navigation systems
x Electronic Stability System?
x ABS?
x Sun-roof?
x ...
= 1025

5. Huge, and complex
Body styles x Engines x Gearboxes
EC-WEB 2014
x Colors
x Air Conditioning systems
x Radios
x Navigation systems
x Electronic Stability System?
x ABS?
x Sun-roof?
x ...
= 1025
Constraints invalidate some combination of features :
technical, industrial and legal constraints, marketing policy
= - "Unglazed rear doors exclude rear wipers" 1020
- "Rear electric windows imply front electric windows"
- ...

6. Huge, and complex
Body styles x Engines x Gearboxes
1 chance upon 100,000 to get an
EC-WEB 2014
x Colors
x Air Conditioning systems
x Radios
x Navigation systems
x Electronic Stability System?
x ABS?
x Sun-roof?
x ...
= 1025
Every combination of features is not possible :
technical, industrial and legal constraints, marketing policy
existing car,
- "Unglazed rear doors exclude rear wipers" - "Rear if electric you pick windows at random imply from front the electric available windows"- specifications
...
1020
= without taking the constraints into account.

7. Automotive ranges
 Cannot be enumerated: defined "in intention"
 A set of Variables and Constraints between their values ("specifications"):
 a "Constraint Satisfaction Problem" (CSP)
EC-WEB 2014
Computationally hard!
 Reasoning software required to handle them

8. How to publish such descriptions?
 The CSP can be represented using Semantic Web languages
 But publishing such data on the web would be too demanding of the clients
 Reasoning better hosted on the server
EC-WEB 2014

9. Configurators:
an effective way of presenting a range to human users
EC-WEB 2014

10. Configurators:
interactive definition of a car, one choice after the other
EC-WEB 2014

11. at each step: list of possible choices, given the choices made so far
Previous selections Possible choices
Previous selections
identify a configuration
Possible choices link to
to refined configurations
The configuration process

12. Configuration as Linked Data
 Each Configuration is identified by a URI
 Configuration = "Partially Defined Product" = state of the configuration process
 Configuration Process = Traversal of a graph of linked Configurations
 = Linked Data!
 Reasoning handled by the server, complexity hidden from the client
 Configuration ontology ("COLD")
 http://purl.org/configurationontology
 3 main classes: Specification, Configuration and ConfigurationLink
 5 properties: chosenSpec, impliedSpec, possible, alternative, impossible
EC-WEB 2014
 the different kinds of relations between a Configuration and a Specification
 A generic, domain independent ontology
 not limited to the automotive industry
 doesn't depend on the vocabulary used for the specifications
 most online configurator applications could use it

13. Entry point: the list of models
<http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/docs#this>
a cold:Configuration ;
cold:possible
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[ a cold:ConfigurationLink ;
rdfs:label "Laguna Hatchback 2011"@en ;
cold:linkedConf <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/c/BAv/AAI#this> ;
cold:specToBeAdded <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/LA3#this>
] ;
cold:possible
[ a cold:ConfigurationLink ;
rdfs:label "Mégane Sport Tourer"@en ;
cold:linkedConf <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/c/BACp/AAI#this> ;
cold:specToBeAdded <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BACp/M3K#this>
] ;
...
Renault range (UK)
Possible choices:
the list of models
Link to Laguna Hatchback...

14. The "Laguna Hatchback" configuration
<http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/c/BAv/AAI#this>
a cold:Configuration ;
cold:chosenSpec <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/LA3#this> ;
cold:possible
EC-WEB 2014
Previous selections
(encoded in the URI,
in clear in the data)
[ a cold:ConfigurationLink ;
cold:linkedConf <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/c/BAv/AAMDg#this> ;
cold:specToBeAdded <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/PT1633_automatic_gearbox#this>
] ;
cold:possible
[ a cold:ConfigurationLink ;
...
<http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/PT1633_automatic_gearbox#this>
a cold:Specification ;
rdfs:label "Automatic Gearbox"@en .
Possible choices
Link to Laguna Hatchback with automatic gearbox

15. The "Laguna Hatchback, automatic gearbox"
<http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/c/BAv/AAMDg#this>
a cold:Configuration ;
cold:chosenSpec
EC-WEB 2014
Previous selections
(encoded in the URI,
in clear in the data)
<http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/LA3#this> ,
<http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/PT1633_automatic_gearbox#this>
cold:possible
[ a cold:ConfigurationLink ;
cold:linkedConf <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/c/BAv/AAMDg#this> ;
cold:specToBeAdded <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/PT1628_diesel#this>
] ;
cold:possible
[ a cold:ConfigurationLink ;
...
gr:hasPriceSpecification [gr:hasCurrencyValue "21795"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#float>...] ;
cold:impliedSpec <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/PT1627_direct_common_rail_with_turbo#this>,...
cold:impossible
[ a cold:ConfigurationLink ;...
Possible choices
More info

16. EC-WEB 2014
Configuration URI
Scenic / Fuel Type Diesel / Gearbox Type Automatic Gearbox / Sunroof
fr.co.rplug.renault.com/.../scenic/diesel_auto_sunroof html
€19,145.00 to €21,085.00
#this a cold:Configuration,
schema:Product,
schema:ProductModel;
schema:name "Scenic / Fuel Type Diesel / Gearbox Type Automatic Gearbox"@en;
schema:offers [ a schema:Offer;
schema:price "19145.0";
schema:priceCurrency "EUR" ];
cold:chosenSpec <http://fr.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/scenic#this>,
<http://fr.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/PT1628_diesel#this>,
<http://fr.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/PT1633_automatic_gearbox#this>;
cold:possible [ a cold:ConfigurationLink;

17. Search engines can effectively index these data
 Accurate description of the range, that can be explored by crawlers
 just a matter of following links
 But 10^20 is huge: partial indexing
 Some specifications have more value than others:
 search engines can choose the links they want to follow (the meaning of each
link being tagged by the specification)
 publishers can provide hints
EC-WEB 2014
 sitemap, no-follow directive
 Handling typical user requests easily manageable
 Typical request: a few specifications (4?)
 "diesel sunroof climate control"
 Number of popular features by car model: 15?
 -> less than 2000 configurations need to be indexed / car model

18. Proposal for Schema.org
 Use a streamlined version of COLD for the description of customizable
products
 (Some properties being needed by advanced configurator applications only)
 Bare minimum: a new Feature (or "ProductFeature") class, and a new feature
property
 an idea shared by several extension proposals
 Beware, to the semantics of the feature property
EC-WEB 2014
 must *not* to be used when a feature is only possible
 Allows consumer applications to correctly index a configuration by its features
 but they don't get the "smart links" provided by cold:possible
 publisher can use the sitemap file of its site to point search engines to configurations
 cold:possible and cold:ConfigurationLink too complex for Schema.org?
 just a matter of reification
 what Schema.org seems to want to handle

19. Conclusion
 Ranges of customizable products can be described as Linked Data
 Accurate descriptions of complex ranges of products, that can be effectively
indexed by search engines
With minimal additions to Schema.org, the description of configurable
products such as cars could gain momentum, opening new opportunities.
Renault range as Linked Data:
 RDF description:
 http://doc.rplug.renault.com/car-configurator/cold/coldjs/configurator.html
 http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/product/gen?as=ttl
 Simple car configurator with RDFa / schema.org markup:
 http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/product/gen?embed=true
EC-WEB 2014