An introduction to the LoCloud Historic Place Names Service presented at the LoCloud training workshops. The presentation provides an introduction to historic place names, which were used in earlier times and are mentioned in historical documents and sources. It introduces the service, an application which enables local cultural institutions to collaborate in developing the Thesaurus of Historic Place Names and enriching metadata.

1. Local
content
in
a
Europeana
cloud
Historical
Place
Names
microservice
LoCloud
is
funded
by
the
European
Commission's
ICT
Policy
Support
Programme
Rimvydas
Laužikas,
Jus<nas
Jaronis,
Ingrida
Vosyliūtė
Vilnius
University
Faculty
of
CommunicaAon

2. • Do
you
know
the
Kingdom
of
Leon?
• Have
you
ever
met
a
person
from
Semigallia?
• Have
you
ever
been
to
Aquinicum?
• Do
you
know
where
AtlanAs
or
Narnia
are
located?

3. Local
history
researcher?
Local
history
database
administrator?
Who
are
you?
OR

4. If
YES
–
you
definitely
need
HPN
microservice

5. If
NO
–
you
definitely
need
HPN
microservice

6. What
is
HPN
microservice?
• HPN
are
not
contemporary
place
names,
they
are
place
names
that
existed
in
history
and
are
menAoned
in
different
historical
sources.
• HPN
microservice
is
an
applicaAon
which
enables
local
cultural
insAtuAons
to
collaborate
in
developing
the
Thesaurus
of
HPN
and
enriching
ingested
metadata.
• HPN
microservice
is
a
semi-­‐automaAc
historical
geo-­‐
informaAon
management
funcAon
and
web
service.
• HPN
microservice
was
developed
by
VUFC
and
AIT
working
with
Athena
RC
building
on
the
results
of
the
CARARE
project.

7. How
to
do
it?

8. GeMng
started
• HPN
–
home
page
• Search/Propose
HPN
–
searching
Thesaurus
and
proposing
a
new
place
name
• Send
HPN
database
–
sharing
your
data
• Web
Service
–
using
API
• Documenta<on
–
microservice
descripAon
• Registra<on
–
exploring
other
possibiliAes
hQp://hpn.aksprendimai.lt/unitedgeo/

9. Two
user
cases
AND

10. Local
history
researcher
[not
registered
user]
• to
verify
the
availability
of
historical
place
name
in
the
LoCloud
HPN
Thesaurus
• to
get
informaAon
about
the
interconnecAon
of
HPN
with
contemporary
place
names,
its
linguisAc
variaAons
and
geographical
coordinates
• to
propose
HPN
as
a
new
place
name
for
the
LoCloud
HPN
Thesaurus

11. To
verify
the
availability
of
historical
place
name
in
the
LoCloud
HPN
Thesaurus
1. Click
on
„Search/
propose
HPN“
2. Enter
Place
name,
or
coordinates,
or
click
on
the
map
3. Click
“Submit”
*NB.
Region
–
subregion
–country
–
are
not
necessary
fields
(addiAonal
for
more
accurate
search)

12. • HPN
–
Danzig
• Contemporary
place
name
–
Gdańsk
(Poland)
• Coordinates
–POINT
(18.6463700000000010;
54.3520499999999984)
• LinguisAc
variaAons
–
Гданьск,
Gdanskas...
HPN
is
available,
e.
g.
Danzig

13. • Click
„Add
place
to
match
with“
and
add
the
new
contemporary
place
to
this
HPN
(see
next
slide)
HPN
is
available,
but
it‘s
not
what
I
hoped,
e.g
Atlan<s

14. • Click
„Add
place
to
match
with“
• Fill
the
fields:
-­‐ United
geoname:
user
proposed
matching
to
contemporary
geoname
-­‐ Geographical
distance:
distance
between
centre
of
the
proposed
place
and
the
centre
of
matched
contemporary
geoname
-­‐ Remark
–
remarks
about
proposed
HPN
-­‐ Best
match
–
must
be
Acked
by
user
• Click
“Submit”
HPN
is
not
available,
e.g
Narnia

15. • All
geonames
proposed
by
user
will
be
verified
by
the
system
administrator
and
a
peer
reviewer
• Aser
verificaAon
process
proposed
geonames
could
be
approved
or
denied

16. Local
history
database
administrator
[registered
user]
• to
export
selected
LoCloud
HPN
Thesaurus
data
sets
(informaAon
about
interconnected
contemporary
place
names,
different
historical
and
linguisAc
place
name
forms
and
geographical
coordinates)
• to
enrich
local
system
with
exported
HPN
geo-­‐data
• to
collaborate
in
developing
the
LoCloud
HPN
Thesaurus
by
sending
your
local
data
or
contacAng
us

17. Enriching
local
databse
CURL
example:
we
search
for
Vilnius!
curl
-­‐u
hpndemo:dslkajco43
-­‐X
POST
hup://
tautosaka.llA.lt/api/hpn/search/
-­‐d
'{"name":
"Vilnius"}'
-­‐-­‐header
"Content-­‐Type:
applicaAon/json"
It
will
return
us
a
long
list
of
matched
Vilnius
synonims,
as
documented.

18. {"coordinates": "POINT (25.2798000000000016 54.6891600000000011)"}
curl -u hpndemo:dslkajco43 -X POST http://tautosaka.llti.lt/api/hpn/search/ -
d '{"coordinates": "POINT (25.2798000000000016
54.6891600000000011)"}' --header "Content-Type: application/json"
CURL
example:
we
can
search
by
coordinates
too!
Results
are
limited
to
9km
threshold.
Result
list
is
exact
as
searching
with
Vilnius

19. HTTP 200 OK
Content-Type: application/json
Vary: Accept
Allow: POST, OPTIONS
[
{
"synonims": [
{
"id": 44,
"united_geoname": 10,
"name": "Vilnius",
"content_type": 339,
"object_id": 593116,
"synonim_name": "Vilnius",
"synonim_content_type": 350,
"synonim_object_id": 1980020,
"language": "",
"identifier": "Alt. name",
"coordinates": "POINT (25.2798000000000016 54.6891600000000011)",
"temporal": []
},
….....................................
],
"id": 10,
"main_name": "Vilnius",
"region": "Vilniaus Apskritis",
"subregion": "Vilnius",
"country": "Lithuania",
"centroid": "POINT (25.2798000000000016 54.6891600000000011)"

20. Collabora<ng
in
the
LoCloud
HPN
Thesaurus
development
CURL
example:
we
post
“Virbalis”
synonim
with
known
establishment
date
1214-­‐06-­‐01
curl
-­‐u
hpndemo:dslkajco43
-­‐X
POST
hup://
tautosaka.llA.lt/api/hpn/
-­‐d
'{"name":
"Virbalis",
"temporal":
[{"date_from":"1214-­‐06-­‐01",
"date_from_format":
"D"}]}'
-­‐-­‐header
"Content-­‐Type:
applicaAon/json"
It
will
return
a
list
of
matched
synonims
and
internal
record
ID,
as
documented.

21. HTTP 200 OK Content-Type: application/json Vary: Accept Allow: GET, POST,
HEAD, OPTIONS
{
"matched_places": [
{
"synonims": [
{
"id": 44,
"united_geoname": 10,
"name": "Virbalis",
"content_type": 339,
"object_id": 593116,
"synonim_name": "Vilnius",
"synonim_content_type": 350,
"synonim_object_id": 1980020,
"language": "",
"identifier": "Alt. name",
"coordinates": "POINT (25.2798000000000016 54.6891600000000011)",
"temporal": []
},

22. Temporal
informa<on
If
possible,
please
provide
Temporal
informaAon
with
Your
submiued
synonim.
Example:
"temporal":
[
{
"date_from":
"2013-­‐05-­‐01",
"date_to":
"2014-­‐06-­‐01",
"date_from_approx":
true,
"date_to_approx":
false,
"date_from_precision":
"D",
"date_to_precision":
null,
"calendar_type":
"G",
"is_interval":
true
}]

23. Field
explana<ons:
"is_interval": boolean, that describes date as single date (only date_from) or
interval (date_to);
"date_from", "date_to": ISO 8601-encoded dates, meaning start and end of
period;
"date_from_approx",
"date_to_approx":
booleans,
describing
if
start
or
end
date
is
known
approximately;
"date_from_precision",
"date_to_precision":
precision,
determining
how
precise
date
record
is.
Possible
values:
D
–
day;
M
–
month;
Y
–
year;
C
–
century
"calendar_type":
"G"
for
Gregorian,
“J”
for
Julian

24. Ques<ons?
Find
microservice:
hQp://hpn.aksprendimai.lt/unitedgeo/
User
documenta<on:
hQp://hpn.aksprendimai.lt/media/cms_page_media/34/
HPN_users_documenta<on.pdf
API
documenta<on:
hQp://hpn.aksprendimai.lt/media/cms_page_media/32/
locloud_d35_hpn_microservice_2014-­‐08-­‐29v10_webserice.pdf
Email
us:
rimvydas.lauzikas@kf.vu.lt,
jus<nas.jaronis@aksprendimai.lt,
ingrida.vosyliute@kf.vu.lt