Topic Maps is a semantic technology for the integration of heterogeneous data and the convenient deployment of domain specific and semantically enriched web portals. Topic Maps is already widely in productive usage in industry and administration. We demonstrate with six projects the current usage and the opportunities of Topic Maps in the eHumanities. The projects are CeDECA from University of Pavia, RAMLine from the London Royal Academy of Music, Pansori Retrieval System from the Sungkyunkwan University Seoul, Musica migrans from the University of Leipzig, Collection of the Finnish National Gallery, and Text and Semantic from Signum in Pisa.

1. eScience Conference 2009, Oxford
Topic Maps in the eHumanities
Dr. Lutz Maicher1 (presenter)
Co-Authors of the paper are: Khalil Ahmed2, Alida Isolani3, Aki
Kivelä4, Sam Oh5, Antony Pitts6, Salvatore Vassallo7
1Topic Maps Lab, University of Leipzig, Germany
2networked planet, Mill Street, Oxford, UK
3Signum - Scuola Normale Superiore, Via della Faggiola n. 19, 56126 Pisa, Italy
4Grip Studios Interactive Oy, Kristianinkatu 15, 00170 Helsinki, Finland
5Sungkyunkwan University LIS, Faculty Hall 40314, Seoul, Korea
6musicDNA & Royal Academy of Music, London, UK
7University of Pavia, P.za del Lino 2, Pavia, Italy
topicmapslab.de

2. Einführung in Topic Maps
What is Topic Maps?
Subject-centric models!
topicmapslab.de Topic Maps in the eHumanities - eScience 2009 Conference - Oxford -
Dr. Lutz Maicher (maicher@informatik.uni-leipzig.de) 2

3. Einführung in Topic Maps
The real world
topicmapslab.de Topic Maps in the eHumanities - eScience 2009 Conference - Oxford -
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4. Einführung in Topic Maps
Subject-centric models of the real world
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5. Einführung in Topic Maps
What can Topic Maps be used for?
topicmapslab.de Topic Maps in the eHumanities - eScience 2009 Conference - Oxford -
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6. Einführung in Topic Maps
Topic Maps is an integration technology
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7. Einführung in Topic Maps
Topic Maps is a portal technology
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8. Einführung in Topic Maps
Topic Maps makes information subject-centric usable
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9. Einführung in Topic Maps
The building blocks of Topic Maps
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10. Einführung in Topic Maps
The data model of Topic Maps (topics)
Nikolaikirche
variant shortname
St. Nikolai type
English
name St. Nicholas Church scope
foundation
occurrence 1165 type
website
occurrence www.nikolaikirche
-leipzig.de/ type
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11. Einführung in Topic Maps
The data model of Topic Maps (associations)
container-containee
containee container
St. Nikolai role type Leipzig
role player ass. role association
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12. Einführung in Topic Maps
Integration model of Topic Maps
The identity of a topic is defined by a set of Subject Identifiers …
St. Nikolai
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leipziger_Nikolaikirche
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Nicholas%27_Church%2C_Leipzig
http://www.nikolaikirche-leipzig.de/
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13. Einführung in Topic Maps
Integration model of Topic Maps
… whenever two topics in one topic map use the same subject identifier,
they will be merged.
St. Nikolai
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leipziger_Nikolaikirche
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Nicholas%27_Church%2C_Leipzig
http://www.nikolaikirche-leipzig.de/
Saint-Nicolas
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Nicholas%27_Church%2C_Leipzig
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14. Einführung in Topic Maps
Integration model of Topic Maps
• Merging of Topics: a new topic replaces the old ones and provides
all information of them as unified access hub
• all subject identifiers
• all names
• all occurrences
• all association roles, the topic is playing in
http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Leipziger_Nikolaikirche
St. Nikolai
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/St._Nicholas%27_Church%2C_Leipzig
http://www.nikolaikirche-leipzig.de/
Saint-Nicolas
and all Occurrences and Roles Played from both Topics …
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15. Einführung in Topic Maps
What are Topic Maps (ISO 13250)?
• Topic Maps are highly-networked data sources
• one topic for each subject
• relationships of subjects are associations between topics
• subject-centric modelling paradigm
• Topic Maps have a human-centric data model
• vocabulary for documenting information fits human cognition
• network resembles human cognition
• Topic Maps have an integration model
• whenever two topics represent the same subject, they have to be merged
• always one information access hub for each subject
• Topic Maps is an international industry standard
(ISO 13250)
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16. Einführung in Topic Maps
How Topic Maps drive Semantic Portals
Case: Musica migrans
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17. Einführung in Topic Maps
The domain of Musica migrans (Lutz Maicher, Leipzig)
has names birthplace of a person
with a lot of different spellings
Person Place
place of death of a person
has educational development place of educational phase
has professional development place of a job
has concerts place of a concert
primary nationality of a person
birthday of a person
Nationality
Date a person
day of death of
secondary nationality of a person
start and end of educational phase goal of educational phase
start and end of a job main profession of a person
date of a concert
archive
Profession
secondary profession of a person
encyclopaedia
confessions of a person profession in a job
Reference Confession
further literature
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18. Einführung in Topic Maps
http://www.musicamigrans.de
topicmapslab.de
List page for personsMaicher (maicher@informatik.uni-leipzig.de) - Oxford -
in Musica migrans
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19. Einführung in Topic Maps
topicmapslab.de
Individual page (general) Lutz Maicher (maicher@informatik.uni-leipzig.de) - Oxford -
for person in Musica migrans
Topic Maps in the eHumanities - eScience 2009 Conference
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20. Einführung in Topic Maps
topicmapslab.de
Individual page (professional carreer)the(maicher@informatik.uni-leipzig.de) migrans
Topic Maps in for person in 2009 Conference - Oxford -
Dr. Lutz Maicher
eHumanities - eScience Musica
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21. Einführung in Topic Maps
topicmapslab.de
Individual page (working places) for(maicher@informatik.uni-leipzig.de)migrans-
Topic Maps in the eHumanities -in Musica
Dr. Lutz Maicher
places eScience 2009 Conference - Oxford 21

22. Einführung in Topic Maps
topicmapslab.de
Individual page for profession(maicher@informatik.uni-leipzig.de) - Oxford -
in Musica migrans
Topic Maps in the eHumanities - eScience 2009 Conference
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23. Einführung in Topic Maps
topicmapslab.de
Professional carreer as mapLutz Maicher (maicher@informatik.uni-leipzig.de) - Oxford -
Topic Mapsa the eHumanities - eScience 2009 Conference
Dr.
for in person in Musica migrans 23

24. Einführung in Topic Maps
topicmapslab.de
Individual page (as pdf dossier)Maicher person -in Musica migrans -
for (maicher@informatik.uni-leipzig.de)
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25. Einführung in Topic Maps
Further Topic Maps projects in the eHumanities
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26. Einführung in Topic Maps http://www.cedeca.it
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27. Einführung in Topic Maps
CeDECA (Salvatore Vassallo, Pavia)
• Topic Maps portal for census of cultural
patrinomy in the province of Pavia, Italy
– Books, Articles, pictures, music, persons, architectural heritage,
archives, immaterial heritage, etc.
– Organised as virtual museum with rooms of places, museum, folklore,
history, memories and books
– Additional two transversal rooms: agents and multimedia items
– Current volume: 1.600 Topics and 4.000 associations
• Main Challenge:
– Impossibility to define a priori the data model (fluid ontology)
– Various Names of individuals
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28. Einführung in Topic Maps
RAMline (Anthony Pitts, London; Khalil Ahmed, Oxford)
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29. Einführung in Topic Maps
RAMline (Anthony Pitts, London; Khalil Ahmed, Oxford)
• Part of long time project at Royal Academy of Music
– Goal: provdie a model for connection between people, places and
musical work
– Provide pupil a tool to chart own musicial development and link it to a
wider context of pathways and influences
• RAMLine is a Topic Maps application built on top of
Microsoft Sharepoint
• RAMLine launched first spinn-off
– musicGPS is an iPhone application
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30. Einführung in Topic Maps
RAMline (Antony Pitts, London; Khalil Ahmed, Oxford)
creating capturing connecting communicating
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31. Einführung in Topic Maps
topicmapslab.de Topic Maps in the eHumanities - eScience 2009 Conference - Oxford -
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32. Einführung in Topic Maps
Pansori Retrieval System (Sam Oh, Seoul)
• Topic Maps based
knoweldge base about the
Korean folk music Pansori
– People and Pansori are first class
objetcs
• User study has been shown
– users locate information with
fewer browsing in less time
– provides conceptual
understanding of a domain
– users performed well in complex
tasks
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33. Einführung in Topic Maps
http://www.signum.sns.it
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34. Einführung in Topic Maps
Text and Semantic (Alida Isolani, Pisa)
• System for support of semantic research by providing
aids for reading and interpretation of philosophical
texts
– Use Case example: Giordano Bruno‘s „De gli eroici furori“
– Users can navigate seperately the work and it‘s various interpretations
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35. Einführung in Topic Maps
Collection of Finnish National Gallery (Aki Kivelä, Helsinki)
topicmapslab.de http://collection.fng.fi/
35

36. Einführung in Topic Maps
Collection of Finnish National Gallery (Aki Kivelä, Helsinki)
• Virtual Museum (as Topic Maps portal) which presents
all artworks from the Finnish National Gallery
– Volume: 33.000 artworks from 3.600 artists (which is 100.000 topics
and 500.000 associations)
• Based on three data packages (provided as Topic Maps)
– FNG‘s information system Muusa provides the most artwork
information, including artist related
– Iconclass vocabulary used to annotate artwork from the Museum for
Contemporary Art Kiasma
• And other ad hoc vocabularies from FNG museums
– Curated texts from exhibitions
– (GUI) texts
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37. Einführung in Topic Maps
Summary
topicmapslab.de Topic Maps in the eHumanities - eScience 2009 Conference - Oxford -
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38. Einführung in Topic Maps
Topic Maps in the eHumanities
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39. Einführung in Topic Maps
Identity and Identification - our main challenge
• In nearly all applications in the humanities we store
networked information about
– Persons
– (historical ) Places
– Events
– Cultural Objects
• To unleash the power of global interconnection
of data we need:
– Normalized Identification of Individuals
– Standardized Ontologies for the eHumanitites domains
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40. Einführung in Topic Maps
Imprint
This talk was provided by the Topic Maps Lab
… it‘s a research group dedicated to Topic Maps technologies.
• Located at the University of Leipzig, Germany
– Chair of the Topic Maps Labs: Dr. Lutz Maicher
Contact: maicher@informatik.uni-leipzig.de
0049 / 341 / 97 32303
• Funded by the BMBF (German Federal Ministry for Research and Education)
• Portal: http://www.topicmapslab.de
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