Serving Ireland’s Geospatial as
Linked Data on the Web
Dr. Atul Nautiyal
ADAPT @ Trinity College Dublin
The ADAPT Centre is funded under the SFI Research Centres Programme (Grant 13/RC/2106) and is co-funded under the European Regional Development Fund.
What is Linked Data?
www.adaptcentre.ie
The Web of Documents were created by humans for humans; the links
between documents bore little meaning for machines and documents
provided little structured information.
Structured information can be found on the Web – such as XML, CSV,
etc. – but, … How do we link data rather than documents, and create a
global “database” of information?
Linked Data is a global initiative to publish and interlink structured
(open) data on the Web using a combination of standardized
technologies (HTTP, URI, RDF) such that …
• any agent can explore the data and links …
• that is fit for the agent (human or computer based) …
• via a “protocol” and …
• allowing one to build innovative applications.
Context
www.adaptcentre.ie
• In 2014, the Ordnance Survey Ireland (OSi)
delivered a newly developed spatial data storage
model known as Prime2.
• With Prime2, OSi moved from a traditional map-centric
model towards an object-oriented model from which
various types of mapping and data services can be
produced.
• OSi furthermore aims to adopt Linked Data to enable
third parties to explore and consume some of OSi's
authoritative datasets. But how? Can Prime2 form the
basis for that?
OSi Linked Data Project
www.adaptcentre.ie
Goal: To lay the foundations of a semantic architecture
and Linked Data platform for the OSi taking into account
best practices and guidelines in the domain of geospatial
information and industry and OSi’s current technology
stack.
Starting from the boundaries dataset, which are open
and already available on data.gov.ie, but not as Linked
Data.
Requirements Analysis
www.adaptcentre.ie
Requirements Analysis including stakeholder
engagement with CSO and DPER:
Formulation of two use case scenarios from which
requirements will be distilled:
• Accessing the same dataset with different geometric
representations, i.e., different generalizations or
“resolutions”.
• Capturing the provenance and evolution of features
and their geometric representations. E.g., legal
statutes to change boundaries.
Concept Representation
www.adaptcentre.ie
Features and
Geometries with
GeoSPARQL
Provenance using
Statute
Instruments with
PROV-O
Necessary
ontologies
developed and
published
Workshops with
DPER and CSO on a
URI Strategy
Information
Resources vs. NonInformation
Resources
Mapping the
Prime2 database
to RDF with R2RML
Conceptual Architecture of the LD Platform
www.adaptcentre.ie
Implementation and Demonstrator
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Implementation and Demonstrator
www.adaptcentre.ie
Description of County Clare
linking to its three representations
Implementation and Demonstrator
www.adaptcentre.ie
Default generalization
with OSi’s base map.
Different representations
Implementation and Demonstrator
www.adaptcentre.ie
Implementation and Demonstrator
Triple Fragments Server
www.adaptcentre.ie
Implementation and Demonstrator
Triple Fragments Client
www.adaptcentre.ie
Query to list
“things” and
their labels
Result of
query
Implementation and Demonstrator
SPARQL Endpoint
Give list of pairs of counties that touch each other
PREFIX rdfs: <http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#>
PREFIX geo: <http://www.opengis.net/ont/geosparql#>
PREFIX geof: <http://www.opengis.net/def/function/geosparql/>
PREFIX osi: <http://ontologies.geohive.ie/osi#>
SELECT DISTINCT ?al ?cl WHERE {
?a a osi:County; geo:hasGeometry ?k.
?k geo:asWKT ?b . ?a rdfs:label ?al.
?c a osi:County; geo:hasGeometry ?l.
?l geo:asWKT ?d . ?c rdfs:label ?cl.
FILTER langMatches( lang(?al), "en" )
FILTER langMatches( lang(?cl), "en" )
FILTER ( ?a != ?c )
FILTER ( geof:sfTouches(?b, ?d) )
}
www.adaptcentre.ie
Creation of Links with Other Datasets
Adding spatial information to external
datasets with OSi’s authoritative
information and OSi’s Linked Data
endpoint as an information
integration hub for Ireland through
locations.
Results drawn
on map
www.adaptcentre.ie
Queries with
spatial
predicates
Team
www.adaptcentre.ie
ADAPT
PM
ADAPT THEME E and
DLAB
OSi