This document summarizes Dongpo Deng's presentation on developing linked geoname data using GeoSPARQL. It discusses transforming a Taiwanese place name dataset into RDF triples using a place name ontology. A linked data server and GeoSPARQL endpoint were created to serve and query the linked place name data. Spatial and temporal SPARQL queries over the data were demonstrated. The linked place names can be used as controlled vocabularies and are connected to other datasets like Geonames.org.

1. 2014
PaciKic
Neighborhoods
Consortium
Annual
Conference
and
Joint
Meeting
Toward
Next
Generation
of
Gazetteer:
Utilizing
GeoSPARQL
For
Developing
Linked
Geoname
Data
Dongpo
Deng
!
Geospatial
Information
Specialist
Institute
of
Information
Science
Academia
Sinica
dongpo@iis.sinica.edu.tw

2. Place
and
Name
• A
place
is
a
meaningful
location
for
people.
• To
identify
places,
people
give
name
for
separating
from
undifferentiated
space.
• A
place
is
a
concept
of
geography.
• A
name
of
a
place
is
about
toponymy.

3. Gazetteer
•
A
gazetteer
is
deKined
by
(Hill,
2000)
as
geospatial
dictionaries
of
geographic
names
with
the
core
components
of
• A
name
(could
have
variant
names
also)
;
• A
location
(coordinates
representing
a
point,
line,
or
areal
location)
;
• A
type
(selected
from
a
type
scheme
of
categories
for
places/features).

4. ADL
Gazetteer

5. Geonames.org

6. Ordnance
Survey
50k
Gazetteer

7. Getty
TGN

8. Research
data
management
(CKAN)
(taijiang.tw)

9. Metadata
management
-
'.-
/-
02
,,,,!
2 #
2+1
*)$

10. /2 (,%

12. Place
name
as
Controlled
Vocabulary

13. Place
name
as
Controlled
Vocabulary

14. Ambiguity
of
Place
names
• Many
places
have
same
name
• A
place
can
have
many
name
• Long
place
names
are
often
shortened
• Spatial
footprints
of
place
names
are
often
difKicult
to
deKine

15. Linked
Data
• Tim
Berners-­‐Lee
(2006)
proposed
4
principles:
1. Use
URIs
as
names
for
things
2. Use
HTTP
URIs
so
that
people
can
look
up
those
names.
3. When
someone
looks
up
a
URI,
provide
useful
information,
using
the
standards
(RDF,
SPARQL)
4. Include
links
to
other
URIs.
so
that
they
can
discover
more
things.

16. Why
Linked
Data?
• To
create
web
of
data
• To
semantically
integrate
data
• To
facilitate
data
reuse
• The
more
Link
data,
the
more
knowledge
can
be
discovered

17. Linked
Open
Data
Cloud
(9/2008)

18. Linked
Open
Data
Cloud
(7/2009)

19. Linked
Open
Data
Cloud
(9/2010)

20. Linked
Open
Data
Cloud
(9/2011)

21. Linked
Open
Data
Cloud
(2014.4)

22. OGC
GeoSPARQL
• The
GeoSPARQL
is
a
new
OGC
standard,
which
provides
three
main
components
for
encoding
geographic
information:
• (1)
The
deKinitions
of
vocabularies
for
representing
features,
geometries,
and
their
relationships;
• (2)
A
set
of
domain-­‐speciKic,
spatial
functions
for
use
in
SPARQL
queries;
• (3)
A
set
of
query
transformation
rules

23. GeoSPARQL
Vocabulary:
Basic
Classes
and
Relations

24. Topological
Relations
between
geo:SpatialObject
A B A B B
A
B
A A B A B
A
B
• OGC
simple
feature
relation
family
• Also
support
RCC8
and
Egenhofer
A/B
geo:sfEquals geo:sfTouches geo:sfOverlaps geo:sfContains
geo:sfWithin geo:sfDosjoint geo:sfIntersects geo:sfCrosses

25. Components
of
GeoSPARQL
• Vocabulary
for
Query
Patterns
• Classes
• Spatial
Object,
Feature,
Geometry
• Properties
• Topological
relations
• Links
between
features
and
geometries
• Datatypes
for
geometry
literals
• geo:wktLiteral,
geo:gmlLiteral
• Query
Functions
• Topological
relations,
distance,
buffer,
intersection,
…
• Entailment
Components
• RDFS
entailment
• RIF
rules
to
compute
topological
relations

26. Some
GeoSPARQL
examples
:City
rdfs:subClassOf
geo:Feature
:School
rdfs:subClassOf
geo:Feature
:Taipei rdf:Type :City
:NTU rdf:type :School
:NTU :isDeveloped “1928-­‐3-­‐16”^^xsd:date
:Taipei geo:hasGeometry :geo_001
:geo_001 geo:asWKT “Polygon((…))”^^geo:wktLiteral
:NTU geo:hasGeometry :geo_002
:geo_002 geo:asWKT “Polygon((…))”^^geo:wktLiteral
:NTU geo:sfWithin :Taipei
beta information
non-geospatial information
geospatial information

27. BBN
Parliament
http://parliament.semwebcentral.org/

28. A
procedure
for
making
data
interlink
Specification
• Distinguish
concepts
of
place
names
• URI
design
Modeling
• Develop
ontologies
Publish
Utility
Transform
• Transform
data
to
RDF
• Publish
the
RDF/OWL
• Utilize
the
RDF/OWL
data
for
services

29. Taiwan
Geographic
Name
Information
System
(http://placesearch.moi.gov.tw/)

30. A
place
name
ontology
geo:Feature
tpn:Place
tpn:featureClass tpn:FeatureType
owl:subClassOf
skos:Concept
owl:subClassOf
geo:inside
time:Interval
geo:Geometry
owl:subClassOf
geo:Point
tpn:Footprint
geo:hasGeometry
geo:asWKT
geo:wktLiteral
tpn:is_in
owl:subClassOf
event:Event
event:place
tpn:memberOf
tpn:name
owl=http://www.w3.org/2002/07/owl#
xsd=http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#
geo=http://www.opengis.net/ont/geosparql#
time=http://www.w3.org/2006/time#
tpn=http://lod.tw/ontologies/geoname.owl#
event=http://purl.org/NET/c4dm/event.owl#
event:time
tpn:Name
(NameCollection)
tpn:PlaceName
time:hasBeginning
time:Instant
tpn:startToUse
tpn:endToUse
time:hasEnd
tpn:altName

31. http://geo.lod.tw
D2R
server

32. http://geo.lod.tw
D2R
server

33. Link
to
Geonames

34. The
place
names
used
in
dutch
colonial
rule
period

35. The
place
names
used
in
dutch
colonial
rule
period

37. Disambiguate
place
names
• ‘⼤大山腳’
is
a
name
of
places
and
a
URI
• There
are
three
places
named
‘⼤大山腳’

38. GeoSPARQL
Endpoint

39. GeoSPARQL
query
(1)
To
Kind
place
names
within
a
spatial
extent
SELECT DISTINCT ?Place ?Place_wkt!
WHERE { !
?Place a tpn:Place;!
geo:hasGeometry ?Place_geo.!
?Place_geo geo:asWKT ?Place_wkt.!
!
FILTER (geof:sfWithin(?Place_wkt, POLYGON((119.99912
23.24348,120.25398 23.24482,120.25398 23.24482,120.25130
23.24348,120.25130 23.24348,120.25666 23.00203,120.00449
23.01276,119.99912 23.24348))”^^sf:wktLiteral)) .!
!
} !

40. Query
result
(1)

41. GeoSPARQL
query
(2)
To
Kind
place
names
within
a
3
km
buffer
and
obtain
their
coordinates
and
distances
SELECT DISTINCT ?p_wkt ?Place_wkt ?distance!
WHERE { !
!
?Place a tpn:Place;!
geo:hasGeometry ?Place_geo.!
?Place_geo geo:asWKT ?Place_wkt.!
http://geo.lod.tw/resource/Point/
01c2db36d23bdadda4beca046ce85e47 geo:asWKT ?p_wkt;!
!
LET (?buff := geof:buffer(?p_wkt, 3000, units:metre)) .!
FILTER (geof:sfWithin(?Place_wkt, ?buff)) .!
LET (?distance := geof:distance(?Place_wkt, ?p_wkt,
units:metre)) .!
}

43. GeoSPARQL
query
(3)
To
Kind
names
of
places
and
their
time
started
to
use
before
Dec.
19,
1900
SELECT DISTINCT ?pName ?tName ?Time_xsd!
WHERE { !
?PN a tpn:PlaceName;!
rdfs:label ?pName;!
tpn:startToUse ?Sart_Interval.!
!
?Start_Interval a time:Interval;!
rdfs:label ?tName;!
time:hasBeginning ?begin.!
!
?begin time:xsdDateTime ?Time_xsd .!
!
Filter (?Time_xsd 1900-12-19T16:00:00Z^^xsd:dateTime ) .!
!
}

44. Query
result
(3)

45. Concluding
remarks
• By
using
the
ontology
of
place
names,
Taiwanese
place
name
dataset
is
transferred
from
spreadsheet
to
triples
(RDF).
• The
uniKied
place
names
can
be
served
as
controlled
vocabularies.
• The
Taiwanese
place
name
dataset
is
not
only
linked
forward
to
Geonames.org,
but
also
linked
backward
to
historical
place
names.
• A
front-­‐end
linked
data
server
(D2R)
is
established
to
demonstrate
the
linked
place
names.
• A
GeoSPARQL
endpoint
(BBN
Parliament)
is
developed
for
serving
spatiotemporal
SPARQL
queries.

46. Slides are available on
http://tinyurl.com/pnc2014ddp
dongpo.deng@gmail.com!
twitter: @dongpo!
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