The group aims to bridge gaps between peer-to-peer database architectures and scaling multimedia information retrieval. They develop a probabilistic multimedia database system with abstraction layers for applications and researchers. They also research challenges of peer-to-peer networks for distributed data management. Both lines are supported by the MonetDB platform to exploit custom hardware and adaptive query optimization. The goal is a modular solution linking theoretical optimal solutions to application demands under resource limitations.

1. INS0
Standardization and Knowledge Transfer – INS0
Mission
The mission of the group is to stimulate dissemination and take-up scientific results through concerted
actions with e.g., standardization committees. Furthermore, small-scale individual projects in the area
of digital libraries are supported pending a better embedding in or outside the institute.
Theme leader
Prof.dr. M.L. Kersten
MSC or CR classification
H5, 68T30, 68T50, I.2.3, I.2.4, I.2.7, F.3.1, F.3.2, F.4.1, F.4.2, D.2.11, H.1.2, H.2.4, H.2, E.1, E.5
Staff
CWI employees
Name Fte Function(s) Period Subthemes + projects
Dr. I. Herman 1.0 researcher indefinite W3C activities
Prof.dr. M.L. Kersten p.m theme leader indefinite INS0
S. Pemberton 1.0 researcher indefinite W3C activities
Lectures, conferences, courses, • XForms and the Semantic Web, The Seman-
tic Web and User Interfaces Workshop, New
project meetings, working visits York, May 18: S. Pemberton.
Lectures • Web Forms - XForms 1.0, WWW2004, New
• Overview of the Semantic Web, Workshop on York, May 19: S. Pemberton.
Ontologies and Metadata, Budapest, Hun- • Why Do XForms Now (Panel), WWW2004,
gary, February 26: I. Herman. New York, May 20: S. Pemberton.
• XForms: What and Why, XForms Industry • XForms Developers Day, WWW2004, New
Briefing, London, April 6: S. Pemberton. York, May 22: S. Pemberton.
• Introduction to the Semantic Web, Invited • XForms for Web Applications, Web applica-
Expert presentation, Visualisation Ontology tionss workshop, San Jose, June 2: S. Pember-
Workshop, Edinburgh, April 7: I. Herman. ton.
• XForms, XML Europe, Amsterdam, April 18: • Tutorial on Basic SW Technologies, Public Tu-
S. Pemberton, tutorial). torial Organized by the W3C German and
• Introduction to the Semantic Web Workshop Austrian Office, Sankt Augustin, Germany,
of the OpenGroup, Brussels, April 19: (In- June 8: I. Herman.
vited talk, ‘Boundaryless Information Flow: • Current developments at W3C, and the Se-
Managing the Flow’): I. Herman. mantic Web. Invited talk at the KRTNET 2004
• On the Design of Notations (Keynote), XML Conference, Seoul, Korea, 24 June: I. Herman.
Europe, Amsterdam, April 19: S. Pemberton. • Questions (and Answers) on the Semantic
• XForms Unplugged, Seybold eForms Summit, Web. Invited talk at the Workshop ‘Ontolo-
Amsterdam, April 20: S. Pemberton. gier i arbete’ Workshop, Kista, Sweden, Au-
• RDF/XHTML, XML Europe, April 21: S. gust 31: I. Herman.
Pemberton. • Towards the Semantic Web. Tutorial at the
• 2D Web Graphics: SVG, Presentation at the Web Intelligence Symposium at the STeP-2004
MIT, Cambridge, USA, April 27: I. Herman. Conference, Helsinki, Finland, September 2: I.
• SVG Tutorial, Public Tutorial Organized by Herman.
the ACM Boston Chapter, Cambridge, USA,
May 1: I. Herman.
147

2. • XHTML, XForms, and the Mobile Web (Keynote), Project meetings
Nokia Technical Conference, Helsinki, Septem- • HTML Working Group meeting, Cannes,
ber 14: S. Pemberton. France, March 1–2, March 4–5: S. Pemberton.
• XForms: Improving the Web Forms Experi- • HTML Working Group meeting, Victoria,
ence (Tutorial), User Experience 2004, Las Ve- Canada, March 7–9: S. Pemberton.
gas, October 6: S. Pemberton. • Forms Working Group meeting, Victoria,
• Styling the New Web Using CSS (Tutorial), Canada, March 9–11: S. Pemberton.
User Experience 2004, Las Vegas, October 8:
HTML Workin Group meeting, Edinburgh,
S. Pemberton.
UK, September 6–8: S. Pemberton.
• Tutorial on Semantic Web Technologies, Uni-
• Forms Working Group meeting, Edinburgh,
versities of Oviedo and Bilbao, Spain, Novem-
UK, September 8–10: S. Pemberton.
ber 2–5: I. Herman.
• HTML Working Group meeting, Dulles, USA,
• XForms: Improving the Web Forms Experi-
November 8–10: S. Pemberton.
ence (Tutorial), User Experience 2004, Amster-
dam, November 4: S. Pemberton. • Forms Working Group meeting, Dulles, USA,
November 10–12: S. Pemberton.
• Styling the New Web Using CSS (Tutorial),
User Experience 2004, Amsterdam, November • W3C Interaction Domain meeting, Boston,
6: S. Pemberton. USA, November 30: S. Pemberton.
• 2D Web Graphics: SVG, invited talk at the • W3C Advisory Committee meeting, Boston,
Media Elements 2004 event, Enschede, the USA, December 2–3: S. Pemberton.
Netherlands, November 12: I. Herman. • W3C Team meeting, Boston, USA, December
• XForms, AOL, Washington DC, November 11: 4: S. Pemberton.
S. Pemberton.
• Questions (and Answers) on Semantic Web, Memberships of committees
invited talk at the W3C Day of the Evolve
2004 Conference, Brisbane, Australia, Decem- and other professional activities
ber 7: I. Herman. I. Herman
• XML to the Desktop (Keynote), XML Holland, • Member of International World Wide Web
Hilversum, December 9: S. Pemberton. Conference Committee (IW3C2).
• Member of the editorial board of the journal
Visits to conferences, workshops, sym- Computer Graphics Forum.
posia • Member of the programme committee of the
• W3C Technical Plenary, Cannes, March 3: S. Eurographics’2004 Conference.
Pemberton.
• XForms Industry Briefing, London, April 6: S. S. Pemberton
Pemberton. • Editor-in-chief, ACM/interactions.
• XML Europe, Amsterdam, April 18–21: S. • Chair, W3C HTML Working Group.
Pemberton.
• Chair, W3C Forms Working Group.
• Seybold e-forms Summit, Amsterdam, April
20: S. Pemberton. • Member of ACM SIGCHI executive commit-
• CHI 2004, Vienna, April 25–29: S. Pemberton. tee.
• WWW2004, New York, May 17–22: S. Pem- • Member of technical programme committee
berton. AVI 2004 (Advanced Visual Interfaces).
• Web Applications Workshop, San Jose, June • Member of panels programme committee
1–2: S. Pemberton. WWW 2004 (World Wide Web Conference).
• Nokia Technical Conference, Helsinki, Septem- • Member of technical programme committee
ber 14: S. Pemberton. XML Europe 2004.
• User Experience Conference, Las Vegas, Octo- • Member of W3C10 programme committee.
ber 4–8: S. Pemberton.
• User Experience Conference, Amsterdam,
November 2–6: S. Pemberton.
• S. Pemberton, W3C10, Boston, December 1.
148

3. INS1
Academic publications teractions, XI(4).
3 S. Pemberton (2004). Things that stay us
Publications in other journals or pro-
from the swift completion of our appointed
ceeeding and other scientific output tasks (revisited) XI(6).
Unrefereed (electronic) journals or proceed-
ings Professional products
1 S. Pemberton (2004). Scratching someone
else’s itch: (why open source can’t do us- Publications for a broad audience
ability) Interactions, XI(1). 1 S. Pemberton (2004). XForms, the Next Gen-
2 S. Pemberton (2004). The Power of Two In- eration of Web Forms, ERCIM News 56i, 8.
Database Architectures and Information Access – INS1
Mission
The work carried out in the research team INS1 is focused on bridging the gap between database archi-
tectures developed for applications in a peer-2-peer (P2P) setting and the need to scale algorithms for
multimedia information retrieval beyond a few thousand elements. Such a multidisciplinary approach
is considered pivotal to make progress in both scientific fields.
The research line on multimedia information retrieval aims at developing a multimedia database
system, which can offer a high level of abstraction to both developers of end-user applications and re-
searchers working on content analysis techniques. At the core of such a system we envision a sound
and flexible probabilistic model to steer the retrieval process, integrated with query optimizers and ker-
nel functionality.
The advanced database architectures research thread is focused on the key challenges posed by P2P
networks as a platform for distributed and heterogeneous datamanagement. This involves research
in all architectural components of a contemporary DBMS to assess, enrich, or replace it to cope with
the ad-hoc nature of said networks. A key scientific challenge is to find the proper balance between
theoretical optimal solutions in the context of hard resource limitations and application demands.
Both research lines are supported by activities geared at bridging the technology gap itself using
our MonetDB experimentation platform. This involves research into novel ways (algorithms, datas-
tructures and software stack) to exploit the potential power of custom hardware and research in query
optimization (language specific, adaptive, cost-models) to achieve a more modular solution. The sys-
tem is widely distributed to provide others a sound and modern database platform, but also to import
user experiences on the choices made.
Theme leader
Prof.dr. M.L. Kersten
MSC or CR classification
H.3.1, H.3.3, H.2.4, H.2, E.1, E.5, H.2.8, I.1.5
Subthemes
Name Leader
INS1.1 – Multimedia Databases A.P. de Vries
INS1.2 – Database Architectures P.A. Boncz
INS1.3 – Query Languages & Optimization S. Manegold
INS1.4 – MonetDB Dissemination N.J. Nes
149