Multimedia Victoria, Chief Technology Office, Victoria Online
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MULTIMEDIA VICTORIA
CHIEF TECHNOLOGY OFFICE VICTORIA ONLINE
VICTORIA ONLINE THESAURUS
DEVELOPMENT PROJECT
REPORT
VERSION 1.2
© State of Victoria, 2005
The VO Thesaurus is subject to copyright. Except as otherwise permitted under the
Copyright Act 1968 you must not reproduce or transmit in any form or by any means the
VO Thesaurus without the prior written permission of the State of Victoria.
You should address all enquiries regarding reproduction and other rights to copyright in the
VO Thesaurus to Victoria Online, Multimedia Victoria, at Level 10, 55 Collins Street,
Melbourne Vic 3000 or by email at [email protected].
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Table of Contents
Introduction.......................................................................................................................... 4
1. Victoria Online Thesaurus - Development .................................................................... 6
1.1 Metadata....................................................................................................................... 7
1.2 Thesauri........................................................................................................................ 9
1.2.1 Requirements of Victoria Online Thesaurus....................................................... 10
1.3 Information gathering and research .......................................................................... 11
1.3.1 Review of existing thesauri................................................................................. 11
1.3.2 Collection of reference languages....................................................................... 15
1.4 Development of application model............................................................................ 16
2. Victoria Online Thesaurus - Construction .................................................................. 17
2.1 Victoria Online Thesaurus scope ............................................................................... 18
2.2 Victoria Online Thesaurus structure .......................................................................... 19
2.3 Business rules............................................................................................................. 25
2.4 Cataloguing example ................................................................................................. 27
3. Victoria Online Thesaurus – Build schedule and report............................................ 28
4. Victoria Online Thesaurus – Maintenance.................................................................. 31
Bibliography ....................................................................................................................... 32
Appendix A – List of reference thesauri .......................................................................... 34
Appendix B – VO Thesaurus Build Timetable/Roster ................................................... 36
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Document Modification
Modifications
The following table outlines modifications made to this document:
Date
22 September 2005
9 September 2005
Issue
1.2
1.2
Pages changed
Cover
All
Replacement details
Copyright statement updated
Comments by Kate Steinfort incorporated
into document
Reformatting of cataloguing example
23 May 2005
1.1
All
10 May 2005
1.0
All
Comments by Kate Steinfort included
Formatting changes to header and footer
Released
Related
Documents
The following table outlines related documents which should be read in
conjunction with the Victoria Online Thesaurus Development Project
Report.
Document Title
Metadata Application Profile and Taxonomy Guidelines
(VOMAP)
Version
3.0
Victoria Online Thesaurus
Topic Taxonomy
Do It Online Taxonomy
Cataloguing New Records on Victoria Online
Modifying Records on Victoria Online
Deleting Records from Victoria Online
ANZI/NISO Standard Z39.19-2003 Guidelines for the
Construction, Format, and Management of Monolingual
Thesauri
1.0
2.0
1.1
1.0
1.0
1.0
n/a
Owner
Chief Technology Office,
Multimedia Victoria,
Department of Infrastructure,
Victorian Government
As above
As above
As above
As above
As above
As above
National Information
Standards Organization (U.S.)
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Introduction
Overview
Victoria Online (VO) is a government entry point for Victorians - funded and
managed by the State Government of Victoria – providing Victorians with a
single entry point to Federal, Victorian State and Local Government
information and services.
VO is a metadata driven portal, which uses the VO Metadata Application
Profile (VOMAP) and a taxonomy structure to support information and
service discovery via searching and browsing.
The Victoria Online (VO) Thesaurus has been developed to populate the
Keyword (DC.Subject) field within the VO Metadata Application Profile
(VOMAP). It has been built according to the VO Thesaurus Guidelines,
which are based on the ANSI/NISO Standard Z39.19-2003 Guidelines for the
Construction, Format, and Management of Monolingual Thesauri.
The Victorian Online Thesaurus Development Report details the processes
and issues involved in the construction of the VO Thesaurus. It outlines the
initial phase of information gathering and research and the development phase
of building terms for the Thesaurus.
The report is structured into the following sections:
1. Development – research, planning and modelling
2. Design – processes, issues and systems
3. Maintenance – quality control, backup, reviewing and updating
Purpose of
this document
The purpose of this document is to report on the process of developing the
VO Thesaurus, and to offer some insight into issues relating to thesaurus
construction for the online environment. It incorporates the VO Thesaurus
Development Guidelines (Version 1.1) which provide guidance to anyone
who wishes to use the Thesaurus to populate the Keyword (DC.Subject) field
within a metadata record on Victoria Online. Victoria Online uses a webbased tool called CiTR accesspoint. for cataloguing.
It is assumed that users of this guideline will have read the ANSI/NISO
Standard Z39.19-2003 Guidelines for the Construction, Format, and
Management of Monolingual Thesauri or have an understanding of the
ANSI/NISO Standard.
Users should also refer the Victoria Online Metadata Application Profile and
to the individual processes relating to cataloguing, modifying and deleting
records for Victoria Online for detailed instructions.
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For further
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This document has been published by Victoria Online, Chief Technology
Office, Multimedia Victoria, Department of Infrastructure.
Any recommended additions or changes to this document are welcome and
should be forwarded to the Metadata Manager. Contact Vanessa Booth,
Metadata Manager, Victoria Online (ph: 9651 9347) for further information.
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1. Victoria Online Thesaurus - Development
In this part
This part contains the following sections:
Topic
Metadata
Thesauri
Information gathering and research
Development of application model
See Page
6
8
10
15
Topic
See Page
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1.1 Metadata
Definition
The AGLS Victoria: Metadata Implementation Manual defines metadata
which supports online delivery as ‘descriptive information about web
resources’.
How VO uses
Metadata
Victoria Online uses metadata to:
•
facilitate discovery of information or services via the portal’s search
and browse capability,
•
inform the design of the user interface (UI),
•
inform the user experience, and
•
ensure high precision low recall in results.
The power of metadata used for discovery in VO enables the user to make an
informed decision about the resource being retrieved, with an emphasis on
providing information pathways.
Metadata helps to ensure consistency in format and presentation of results in
the user interface. Metadata optimises internal discovery (both search and
browse) to provide clear logically meaningful information with an emphasis
on high precision and low recall.
Within VO, metadata describes a html resource (eg. a web page).
The element in VOMAP that utilises the Thesaurus is DC.Subject (CiTR
Accesspoint field name Keywords).. The following extract from VOMAP
articulates its application.
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Keywords
HTML Metatag Name
Encoding Scheme
Controlled List
Mandatory
Repeatable Field
Repeatable Value
Displayed (in VO user interface)
Default Value
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DC.Subject
VO.Keywords
VO Thesaurus
Yes
No
Yes
No
No
Functional Use
•
Specific phrases and words which are a vital source of search terms
Guidelines
•
Look for major themes/ topics/ products/ services from the page and also
consider any synonyms, acronyms which a user might reasonably use in
searching for these topics
• As it is sometimes impossible to catalogue all topics covered within a web
resource, put yourself in the user’s shoes and try to think about which topics the
user might find useful
• Express the concepts using phrases and terms which as far as possible reflect
both the usage by the authors of the page and likely usage by citizens and
government employees who have come to VO to look for information and
services
• Try to make sure that when the user opens the page, s/he can quickly see why
they have been led to it! In other words, the keywords need to be specific to the
page you are cataloguing (even if the keywords represent links only), and not to
deeper pages
• Both content selection and translation into terms and phrases (keywords) will be
subjective processes and therefore open to interpretation. The quality assurance
process should assist in ensuring the best possible keywords are applied
Very Important
• Each keyword/ phrase should begin with an upper case letter and should be
delimited by a semi-colon, eg. Education; Training; Courses
• Ensure consistency in terminology
• Use the Victoria Online thesaurus
• Provide the full term as well as the acronyms, ensuring that all forms are
separated , eg. Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome; SARS
• Use Australian English NOT American English where preferable. Instances
where American English is used you will need to include both, eg.
Organisations not Organizations
• Add multiple keywords where appropriate to “push up” the record - this will
improve the relevance ranking of the record
Validations
•
This element is mandatory and must be complete for a metadata record to be
valid
Source: Victoria Online Metadata Application Profile and Taxonomy Guidelines
(VOMAP) Version 3
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1.2 Thesauri
Definition
A thesaurus is a controlled vocabulary in which equivalence, hierarchical and
associative relationships are identified for purposes of improved retrieval.1
Value of
thesauri
Indexing without using a thesaurus means that different descriptive terms can
be assigned to resources about the same subject. For example, consider:
~ Car licence
~ Motorcar licence
~ Driving licence
~ Driving license
~ Drivers licence
~ Driving permit
All refer to the concept of the licence that one obtains to drive a car. If no
control is placed on subject keywords, any of these might be used by an
indexer to describe a resource about driving licences. Similarly, users
searching for information or resources commonly define the same query using
differing terms. If there is no guidance to one term from a set of synonymous
terms through the use of a thesaurus, users may not be able to locate all the
resources that are relevant to their search.
The implementation of a thesaurus means that variant terms (synonyms,
abbreviations, acronyms, etc) can be mapped to a single preferred term for a
particular concept.
Furthermore thesauri provide hierarchical (Broader, Narrower) and
associative (Related) relationships between terms, which can greatly assist the
indexer in selecting terms to assign to a resource.
Thesauri
standard
The ANSI/NISO Standard Z39.19-2003 Guidelines for the Construction,
Format, and Management of Monolingual Thesauri is the accepted standard
for thesauri. It sets out guidelines for the design, construction and
management of thesauri. The objective of the Standard is not to provide a set
of prescriptive rules but rather as a set of guidelines which can be interpreted
for specific needs of the thesaurus under construction.
1
Rosenfeld, L & Morville, P. Information architecture for the world wide web. 2nd ed. Sebastopol CA :
O’Reilly & Associates, 2002
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1.2.1 Requirements of Victoria Online Thesaurus
Use requirements
Primary use
The Victoria Online Thesaurus is primarily intended for use by cataloguers
describing resources in Victoria Online, applying it to the DC.Subject element
(VO.Keyword field). It will initially be made available in print or database
format separate to the CiTR accesspoint environment. Cataloguers can use the
Thesaurus to select terms and the associated synonyms, and also be directed
to related terms which may be appropriate for the same resource. There are
plans to load the Thesaurus into the accesspoint environment in a later build
during 2005.
Secondary use
The VO Thesaurus terms populating resources will then assist visitors to the
Victoria Online website searching for information by providing highly
relevant keywords incorporating popular and natural user language. Visitors
may use different terms to search for a concept but they will be directed to the
most relevant resource.
Tertiary use
It is planned that the Thesaurus will furthermore be utilised within the Front
Office of Victoria Online to assist site visitors in search refinement. If a
visitor utilises a VO Thesaurus term when performing a search and that term
possesses either narrower terms or related terms they will be offered the
option of searching on the narrower or related terms in order to refine their
search.
Language
requirements
The language used for Victoria Online Thesaurus is to be directed by search
terminology rather than more “correct” terminology that might be available in
existing thesauri. The purpose of the thesaurus is to improve discoverability
through resource description, and as such it needs to direct user searches to
the most appropriate resources to his or her search language.
Technical
requirements
The Thesaurus was built using MultiTES Pro 2005, a specialist thesaurus
software product that effectively manages the relationships between terms.
The Thesaurus can be reported out from the MultiTES database in a number
of formats, including .txt, delimited, .html and .xml format.
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1.3 Information gathering and research
1.3.1 Review of existing thesauri
Introduction
The first stage in this project was the review of existing thesauri and other
models to identify best practice in thesaurus development and utilisation
within the online environment. A 2002 review of thesauri use within the
Victorian Government evaluated the applicability of the TAGS thesaurus in
the Victorian Government online environment. In this current project, a large
number of thesauri were consulted and considered. The following five
thesauri and/or controlled vocabularies were closely examined as to use,
context and processes.
Thesaurus of
Australian
Government
Subject
(TAGS)
The development of TAGS was sponsored by the National Office for the
Information Economy (NOIE) as part of the Australian Whole of Government
High Level Thesaurus Project. The purpose of the Project was to develop a
high level thesaurus of subject terms for use by Government agencies, which
all agencies might use in the AGLS Subject element to describe their
resources. It is a relevant model to consider, as it is:
•
•
•
developed within the Australian context
developed by and for Australian government
a subject-oriented thesaurus as opposed to a functional thesaurus
Scope and
application
TAGS describes Commonwealth information and services, and its main
purpose is to aid agencies in creating subject metadata. As such it does not
cover State government-related information as thoroughly.
Standards
TAGS conforms with ANSI/NISO Z39.19, Guidelines for the Construction,
Format and Management of Monolingual Thesauri - the standard for structure
and organisation of information retrieval thesauri.
Structure
TAGS is a hierarchical thesaurus which uses a “tree” structure starting with
broad concepts which then break down to narrower concepts. There is a
maximum of 3-4 levels in each hierarchy. This is complemented by 17 highlevel clusters, or “Subject categories”, that collect together related terms.
Synonyms have been included for most terms, and they are treated as nonpreferred terms – ie, they direct the indexer to a preferred term. TAGS
includes all APAIS (Australian Public Affairs Information Service Thesaurus)
terms that are within its scope. Proper names and geographic names have
been excluded as TAGS is specifically for Subject description.
Language
TAGS presents concepts in a neutral way and as such tries to avoid jargon
and bureaucratic language as far as possible.
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Evaluation
The scope, structure and language of TAGS are relevant to Victoria Online
and as such this thesaurus is a useful reference for this project. However
funding for the TAGS project has been discontinued, and as a result the
thesaurus has not been maintained since January 2002. This reduces its
viability as a sole model to adopt for the Victoria Online thesaurus, as
thesauri are most effective when they are actively maintained to reflect
inevitable changes in terminology and scope. TAGS remains a useful
reference but can only be used as a reference rather than an ongoing source of
term development.
Government
of Canada
Core Subject
Thesaurus
(CST)
CST is the default controlled vocabulary for Canadian federal departments. It
is designed to be a broad, high-level post-coordinated thesaurus. A Common
Look and Feel (CLF) Standard for Government of Canada Internet sites
requires that a controlled vocabulary be used for subject metadata, and the
Government of Canada Core Subject Thesaurus (CST) was adopted for this
purpose. CST exists in both English and French. It was used as a model for
TAGS and is a good example of a working government thesaurus.
Scope and
application
CST was originally derived from the Depository Services Program Subject
Thesaurus, which was developed as a source for subject descriptors for the
Government of Canada Publications Database. It was developed on a number
of indexing projects that extracted broad, high-level terminology used in the
database. All fields of knowledge are represented, but to varying degrees in
specific subject areas. It is intended for use by those developing web sites
within the Government of Canada.
Standards
CST was developed in accordance with the Guidelines for the establishment
and development of monolingual thesauri (ISO 2788-1986) and the
Guidelines for the establishment and development of multilingual thesauri
(ISO 5964-1985).
Structure
CST follows a standard thesaurus structure with preferred, non-preferred
(“lead-in”), broader, narrower and related terms. Terms are generally
expressed in plural form except for those representing abstract concepts.
Compound terms appear in regular word order rather than inverted. It
includes subject categories within its structure to which terms are assigned.
Language
There is not an expressed direction as to the level of language used within
CST, but it can be noted that it is comparable with TAGS, which was based
on CST, and as such uses mostly natural language and tries to avoid jargon.
Evaluation
CST is very similar to TAGS in many ways, although it is more regularly
updated. The language is generic enough to be considered, but the scope is
still limited to federal activities, and as such is not broad enough to satisfy the
requirements of a thesaurus for Victoria Online. It remains a useful reference
for the project.
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Australian
Public Affairs
Information
Service
Thesaurus
(APAIS)
The APAIS thesaurus was first published by the National Library of Australia
in 1980 to facilitate online searching of the Australian Public Affairs
Information Service database, a subject guide to literature in the social
sciences and the humanities. It is periodically updated, usually on an annual
basis, and is managed by the National Library of Australia.
Scope and
application
The APAIS thesaurus lists the subject terms used to index articles for APAIS:
Australian Public Affairs Information Service, a subject guide to literature in
the social sciences and humanities. The published Thesaurus has also been
adopted in a number of wider projects that require a structured list of
Australian subject terms, such as the recommendation for its use for subject
indexing when using the Australian Government Locator Service metadata
standard.
Standards
The XML format used for the APAIS thesaurus conforms to the XML DTD
defined in Zthes: a Z39.50 Profile for Thesaurus Navigation maintained by
the Library of Congress. This Z39.50 profile supports the semantic
hierarchies of thesaurus terms as described in ISO 2788: Guidelines for the
establishment and development of monolingual thesauri, 2nd ed. Geneva:
ISO, 1986.
Structure
APAIS employs a standard thesaurus structure, with preferred, nonpreferred,
broader, narrower and related terms. Scope notes are included when deemed
useful.
Language
The language employed in APAIS is not specified, but it tends towards more
academic vocabulary, in keeping with its genesis from a research database. As
such this means that technical and bureaucratic terms are commonly selected
as preferred terms over more natural language.
Evaluation
The scope of APAIS limits its relevance to Victoria Online, as it only covers
the areas of social science and the humanities with any depth. Furthermore,
the language is more slanted towards academic or specialised users rather
than the VO user profile, which includes the general Victorian public as well
as government employees. Finally, as is the case with many thesauri with
academic pedigrees, a number of the terms have minimal interrelationships
within the thesaurus. APAIS remains a useful reference but is not appropriate
for use by Victoria Online as a keyword thesaurus.
Subjects of
New Zealand
(SONZ) and
Functions of
New Zealand
(FONZ)
Thesauri
The Function and Subject elements of the NZGLS metadata standard require
the use of the Functions of New Zealand (FONZ) and the Subjects of New
Zealand (SONZ) thesauri. Terms from both these thesauri are combined to
describe government information, services and other resources in a consistent
manner.
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Scope and
application
Both are intended for application according to the NZGLS metadata standard
requirements for metadata description of New Zealand government online
resources.
Standards
The thesauri comply with thesaurus standards Z39.50 and ISO 2788:
Guidelines for the establishment and development of monolingual thesauri,
2nd ed. Geneva: ISO, 1986.
Structure
SONZ and FONZ follow international conventions, and are structured in a
hierarchy made up of broader, narrower and related terms.
Language
The thesauri differ in language in keeping with their differing scopes. FONZ
employs quite “official” language in keeping with its purpose of describing
the activities of government. It comes from government document
terminology which has then been standardised. SONZ uses less official
language, and is based (not exclusively) on the New Zealand Parliamentary
Library thesaurus.
Evaluation
FONZ and SONZ are excellent tools, and are furthermore actively
maintained, but are again limited by their scope in that they apply to a federal
context, whereas the VO Thesaurus needs to be relevant to federal, state and
local resources. They are helpful as reference tools but not appropriate as
primary tools.
Discussion
As well as these examples that were examined in depth, a broad range of
thesauri were consulted and considered as possible tools for Victoria Online.
It is recommended that no existing thesaurus offers the necessary scope and
language to adequately serve as a sole vocabulary tool for Victoria Online.
It was therefore agreed that a new thesaurus would be constructed for Victoria
Online that can use existing thesauri as reference tools but that will be
specifically constructed to match the scope, language and structural
requirements of Victoria Online.
A list of the thesauri that were consulted during the research and development
phases of this project is included as Appendix A at the end of this report.
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1.3.2 Collection of reference languages
Introduction
To identify relevant language outside of existing thesauri, search terms were
gathered from Victoria Online and other key Victorian Government websites.
These were collated and referred to during the build process to ensure that
user-driven language was a reference point for thesaurus development.
Search terms
A request for popular search terms was sent out to contacts across Victorian
government. Search terms were gathered from the following sources:
Victoria Online top 1000 search terms
Business Victoria
Department for Victorian Communities
Department of Human Services
Department of Innovation, Industry and Regional Development
Department of Justice and Consumer Affairs Victoria
Department of Justice
Department of Premier and Cabinet
Department of Primary Industries
Department of Treasury and Finance
Education Channel
Environmental Protection Authority
Health Channel
State Revenue Office
Victorian Curriculum and Assessment Authority
Victoria
Online
keywords
The keywords that are currently employed in Victoria Online were also
reported out and used as a reference for language and scope.
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1.4 Development of application model
Thesaurus
construction
and standards
The ANSI/NISO Standard Z39.19-2003 Guidelines for the Construction,
Format, and Management of Monolingual Thesauri is the accepted standard
for thesauri. It sets out guidelines for the design, construction and
management of thesauri. The objective of the Standard is not to provide a set
of prescriptive rules but rather as a set of guidelines which can be interpreted
for specific needs of the thesaurus under construction. The Victoria Online
Thesaurus follows the Standard but deviates where required.
Thesauri in
the online
environment
The use of thesauri in the online environment differs slightly from the more
traditional uses of thesauri in the application of equivalent terms. In a
traditional thesaurus, one term within a group of synonymous or nearsynonymous terms is selected as the preferred term, and the other variants
become the non-preferred terms. When the thesaurus is used to choose
descriptors for a particular document or resource, only preferred terms may be
selected and the indexer is directed from any non-preferred term to its
preferred equivalent.
In the online environment, the model put forward by Rosenfeld and Morville2
proposes that a preferred term becomes the centre of its own semantic
network, where the non-preferred terms become variant terms to the preferred
term and are retained within the cataloguing process as alternative terms
describing the resource.
Conceptual
framework
It was agreed that the VO Thesaurus needed to vary from the established ISO
2788 Standard because of its intended application for enhancing
discoverability within Victoria Online, an online environment. This online
environment necessitates the application of the online thesaurus model as
detailed above, where synonyms are retained in cataloguing as alternative
terms describing the resource.
The scope of the Thesaurus was finalised and Business Rules developed to
guide term development.
2
Rosenfeld, L and Morville, P. (2002) Information architecture for the world wide web. 2nd edition.
Cambridge : O’Reilly
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2. Victoria Online Thesaurus - Construction
In this part
This part contains the following sections:
Topic
Victoria Online Thesaurus scope
Victoria Online Thesaurus structure
Business Rules
Cataloguing example
See Page
18
19
25
27
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2.1 Victoria Online Thesaurus scope
Scope
In Scope
The scope of the Victoria Online Thesaurus is the topics, themes and issues
resourced in Victoria Online metadata. It is referenced by the subjects
covered in the Victoria Online taxonomy and by the top 1000 search terms
input within Victoria Online by site visitors. It is a subject thesaurus,
describing thematic concepts, issues and topics, as opposed to describing the
government agencies that provide information and services relating to these.
Out of Scope
The Victoria Online Thesaurus does not include people or place names.
Where terms relevant to the Did You Mean Thesaurus are identified during
the course of this project, they will be noted in the DYM field, but otherwise
the full Did You Mean brief is out of scope for the Victoria Online Thesaurus.
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2.2 Victoria Online Thesaurus structure
Structure
summary
The Victoria Online Thesaurus is constructed with reference to the
ANSI/NISO Standard Z39.19-2003 Guidelines for the Construction, Format,
and Management of Monolingual Thesauri in terms of standard thesaurus
fields and practices. The Victoria Online Thesaurus structure is extended
from the Standard in the treatment of non-preferred terms and the inclusion of
an additional field ‘Did You Mean’. The structure of the Thesaurus is as
follows:
1
2
Field Name Element
TERM
Preferred Term
UF
Synonymous
Term
3
SN
Scope Note
4
5
BT
NT
Broader Term
Narrower Term
6
RT
Related Term
7
DYM
Did You Mean
8
HST
History
Notes
Preferred Term
Synonymous Term – equivalent to
USE FOR terms in standard
thesauri
Scope Note – not mandatory but
included where appropriate)
Broader Term – more general term
Narrower Term – more specific
term
Related Term – thematically
connected term
Did You Mean – term(s) used in
the Did You Mean thesaurus
History note – to record changes
and decisions against particular
terms note
The fields are now described in more detail.
TERM
This is the term which has been nominated as the preferred term for a given
concept or subject. The Business Rules in the next section give more
comprehensive direction as to the selection and construction of a term, but the
aim in nominating a term as preferred indicates that it is the most popular and
understood amongst the target user group.
Validation
This field is mandatory and must be complete in order for a Thesaurus entry
to be valid.
Example
TERM Animal registration
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The Victoria Online Thesaurus deviates from the Standard in its application
of synonymous terms. While a preferred term is still to be nominated, the
non-preferred terms or synonyms are also to be used in conjunction with the
preferred term when populating the Keyword (DC.Subject) metadata field.
The Business Rules in the next section give more comprehensive direction as
to the selection and construction of synonymous terms, but in summary they
include the following:
~ synonyms (eg Bushwalking, UF Hiking)
~ near synonyms (eg Animal registration, UF Pet registration)
~ narrower but not used concepts (eg Animal registration, UF Cat
registration)
~ singular forms of non-standard plurals (eg Libraries UF Library)
~ abbreviations and acronyms if commonly known; alternatively the full
version of an abbreviation or acronym if the shorter version is the
more common (eg UF AIDS)
~ spelling variations such as American spelling or different spacings (eg
Licensing UF Licencing), but not spelling errors (these will be
covered by the Did You Mean thesaurus).
Validation
This field is not mandatory for a Thesaurus entry to be valid but is strongly
advised and should be included if possible.
Examples
TERM Bushwalking
UF Hiking
UF Bush walking
TERM Animal registration
UF Pet registration
UF Cat registration
TERM Libraries
UF Library
TERM VCE
UF Victorian Certificate of Education
TERM Licensing
UF Licencing
SN
Scope Note
Scope notes are to be created for terms where the meaning or intended use is
ambiguous or needing further clarification. Scope notes are not required to be
full grammatical sentences.
Validation
This field is not mandatory for a Thesaurus entry to be valid but is to be
included if useful in supporting application of the thesaurus during
cataloguing.
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Example
TERM Accreditation
SN Resources on the formal recognition of programs or courses according to
agreed national quality standards
BT
Broader Term
A Broader Term relationship indicates a broader hierarchical concept than the
concept represented by a term. According to the Standard, Broader Terms can
be:
~ generic – the link between a class and its species; all instances of the
narrower concept are classifiable under the broader concept
~ whole-part – one concept is inherently included in another, regardless
of context
~ instance – the link between a general category of things or events, and
an individual instance of that category, often a proper name
~ polyhierarchical - some concepts are subordinate, on logical grounds,
to more than one category
Validation
This field is mandatory for a Thesaurus entry to be valid except in the case of
top terms, which are the limited number of terms within the thesaurus at the
top of the hierarchical structure.
Examples
TERM Air pollution
BT Pollution (generic)
TERM Mobile phones
BT Telephones (whole-part)
TERM Ombudsmen
BT Officials (instance)
TERM Broadcasting
BT Mass media
BT Telecommunications (polyhierarchical)
NT
Narrower
Term
A Narrower Term relationship indicates a narrower hierarchical concept than
the concept represented by a term. According to the Standard, Narrower
Terms can be:
~ generic – the link between a class and its species; all instances of the
narrower concept are classifiable under the broader concept
~ whole-part – one concept is inherently included in another, regardless
of context
~ instance – the link between a general category of things or events, and
an individual instance of that category, often a proper name
~ polyhierarchical - some concepts are subordinate, on logical grounds,
to more than one category
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Validation
This field is not mandatory for a Thesaurus entry to be valid.
Examples
TERM Pollution
NT Air pollution (generic)
TERM Telephones
NT Mobile phones (whole-part)
TERM Officials
NT Ombudsmen (instance)
TERM Accommodation & housing
NT Aged accommodation (polyhierarchical)
RT
Related Term
A Related Term is a term that is neither equivalent (synonymous) or
hierarchical (broader or narrower) but which is conceptually associated with
another term. The relationship is symmetrical, in that the relationship is
represented in both associated terms’ structures. Related Terms can be:
~ overlapping sibling terms – two terms under the same broader term
that share some meaning
~ derivational – two concepts linked by a familial relationship
~ from different hierarchies – two concepts that are separate from each
other in the broader hierarchical structure but still conceptually linked
Validation
This field is not mandatory for a Thesaurus entry to be valid.
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Examples
TERM ABN
BT Business practice & administration
RT Business taxation (overlapping sibling term)
TERM Business taxation
BT Business practice & administration
RT ABN (overlapping sibling term)
TERM Rivers & streams
RT Wetlands (derivational)
TERM Owner builders
BT Home owners
RT Home ownership (different hierarchies)
TERM Home ownership
BT Ownership
RT Owner builders (different hierarchies)
The Victoria Online Thesaurus includes an additional notes field entitled
DYM
Did You Mean DYM, or Did You Mean. This field links in with the Did You Mean feature
of Victoria Online, where unsuccessful searches can be guided to more
relevant queries. The Did You Mean function is manually maintained by VO
cataloguers using the Did You Mean Thesaurus, a separate thesaurus to the
Victoria Online Thesaurus. The DYM field records the connection between
these two thesauri. DYM can include spelling errors.
Validation
This field is not mandatory for a Thesaurus entry to be valid.
Example
TERM Accommodation
DYM Accomodation
HST
History
The History note can be used to record changes and decisions against
particular terms. Note – this information should be duplicated elsewhere as
deleted terms will lose this information within the MultiTES database)
Validation
This field is not mandatory for a Thesaurus entry to be valid.
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Example
TERM ABN
HST 23/2/05 Nonpreferred term ABN replaces Australian Business Number
as preferred term due to analysis of user searches
SC
Subject
Category
Subject Categories are to be assigned to all preferred terms. Subject
Categories are useful in classifying terms within a thesaurus into different
streams, in effect allowing the generation of multiple microthesauri. 30
Subject Categories have been established (see Appendix B) for the Victoria
Online Thesaurus. Note that the categories General and Measurement are
used for structural reasons and are not intended for the generation of
microthesauri.
Validation
All preferred term must have at least one Subject Category assigned against
it. Multiple Subject Categories are allowed if appropriate.
Example
TERM Accidents
SC: EM Emergencies
TERM Accommodation
SC: CM Community
SC: PR Property
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2.3 Business rules
Introduction
The following business rules have informed the creation of terms for the
Victoria Online Thesaurus
1. Preferred
term selection
Language selected for preferred terms is to be guided mostly, but not
necessarily, by user language as expressed in Victoria Online searches
(referenced by the top 1000 search statistics). This comes under the
parameters of user warrant as defined in the ANSI/NISO standard, where
frequent requests for information on a concept or free-text searches on a
concept by users of an information storage and retrieval system can justify the
inclusion and/or preference for the representation of that concept.
2.
Grammatical
form
Concepts are to be represented as nouns (eg. Museums), verbal nouns (eg.
Bushwalking) and or noun phrases (eg. Educational policy; Power of
attorney) and in plural forms in the Thesaurus, which is the common practice
in most English-language thesauri. The exception to this is for non-count
nouns, for example Weather or Education, where the plural form is not
commonly used.
* NOTE: Where there is a non-standard variation between the singular and
plural of a term (eg Library / Libraries) the singular is to be included as a
synonym.
** NOTE: Where the singular and plural forms of a term represent different
concepts, separate descriptors should be entered into the thesaurus as
appropriate, possibly distinguished by a qualifier. (Eg. Building vs Buildings
could feasibly be distinguished by Building (Construction) and Buildings
(Edifices))
3. Term
specificity –
single versus
multiple
concepts
Multiple concepts may be represented in the Thesaurus by compound terms
(eg. Indigenous policy) rather than requiring the cataloguer to use multiple
broader terms (eg. Indigenous Australians and Policy).
4. Treatment
of
abbreviations
and acronyms
The most common and meaningful form of concepts is to be nominated as the
preferred term, whether or not this is an acronym, for example AIDS v.
Acquired Immune Deficiency Syndrome. Note that in these cases the
alternative form is to be included as a synonymous or non-preferred term.
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Synonymous terms are to encompass the following:
~ synonyms (eg Bushwalking, UF Hiking)
~ near synonyms (eg Animal registration, UF Pet registration)
~ narrower but not used concepts (eg Animal registration, UF Cat
registration)
~ singular forms of word if plural is non-standard (eg Libraries UF
Library)
~ abbreviations and acronyms if commonly known (eg UF AIDS)
~ spelling variations such as American spelling (eg Licensing UF
Licencing)
Synonymous terms are not to include common spelling errors; these are to be
recorded in the DYM (Did You Mean) field (eg Accommodation, DYM
Accomodation)
6. Proper
names
If a concept is most popularly represented by a product/program name, eg.
Victorian Certificate of Education, the proper name may be used as the
preferred term. In the above example, the lifespan of the program is
sufficiently substantial to warrant its inclusion. Shorter-term or smaller-scale
programs, products and/or marketing campaigns are not as perpetual, and so
should be represented by subject terms, eg. Road safety campaigns. Personal
names, government department names and specific legislation titles are not to
be included. Note – these concepts may alternatively be included as
synonyms if desired.
Eg) Road transport authorities
UF Vic Roads, VicRoads, RTA
7. Spelling
The Macquarie Dictionary is the authority for spelling. Australian English is
the preferred spelling form but spelling variations will be recorded as
synonyms. Common spelling errors will be recorded in the Did You Mean
field.
8. Use of scope Scope notes are to be created for terms where the meaning or intended use is
ambiguous or needing further clarification. Scope notes are not required to be
notes
full grammatical sentences.
9. Use of
qualifiers
Qualifiers have not been used in the current VO Taxonomy but may be
considered pending further investigation into functional requirements in
accesspoint.
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2.4 Cataloguing example
Overview
When selecting subject terms, the cataloguer may use either the print version
or the inbuilt system version of the Thesaurus. The cataloguer should choose
the most specific subject relevant to the resource at hand, eg Educational
policy rather than Policy, but may be guided to include the Broader and
Narrower terms if appropriate.
When selecting a term for a resource, the cataloguer selects the term
(preferred term) and its synonym group (non-preferred terms). For example, if
the cataloguer chooses
(TERM)
Career counselling
s/he should also include all relevant terms from the synonym group of variant
or non-preferred terms:
(SYN)
Career advice; Career counselling; Career guidance [etc]
The Broader Term/s and Narrower Term/s should be evaluated and, if
relevant, included as descriptors for the resource at hand, for example:
(BT)
Counselling services
The Related Terms should then be evaluated and, if relevant, include them as
descriptors for the resource at hand, for example:
(RT)
Career education; Career information; Professional development
Note - related terms are often but not always relevant, and the cataloguer must
exercise discretion when choosing to use them for any particular resource.
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3. Victoria Online Thesaurus – Build schedule and report
Overview
A timetable was developed to assist in the VO Thesaurus build process. The
30 Subject Categories were assigned to the staff available for the build project
(Anna Gifford and Vanessa Booth). See Appendix B for the full Schedule
details. Every subject category build was reviewed by the other cataloguer
during the build period. Quality checks were employed during the build
period to ensure structural integrity was maintained.
Training
Vanessa Booth was trained in the practice of thesaurus development, focusing
on the development of relationships, the selection of terminology and the use
of MultiTES Pro 2005.
Thesaurus
Build Phase
For each subject category, the popular search terms were reviewed alongside
existing Victoria Online keywords currently being used to populate that
subject. The concepts expressed in the current and new VO taxonomies were
also considered to ensure that the required scope was adequately covered.
Terms were input into a MultiTES Pro 2005 database, which allowed the
development of equivalent, hierarchical and associative relationships.
Existing thesauri were used as references to assist in relationship construction
and language selection.
During the build period, regular system checks were made to ensure:
the number of top terms (ie. terms which have no hierarchically
superior terms) was limited in number and in scope – only very
general concepts were permitted to be top terms
all preferred terms had at least one Subject Category
all non-preferred terms had no Subject Category
no orphan terms (ie. terms that are not related by hierarchical or
associative relationships to any other terms)
Regular backup files were generated throughout the span of the build phase.
Final checks included ensuring that all “Also of Interest” topics were covered,
re-checking that the concepts represented in the top 1000 Victoria Online
search terms were adequately covered, and that common local council
activities were included.
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The thesaurus was completed in May 2005. It consists of the following:
2054 preferred terms
2722 nonpreferred terms (synonyms)
4776 total number of terms
71 top terms (3.5% of total preferred terms)
0 orphan terms
Since May, the thesaurus has continued to grow as new terms are added
within normal cataloguing activities. As of September 2005 the thesaurus
stands at:
2170 preferred terms
3107 nonpreferred terms (synonyms)
5217 total number of terms
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The following totals of terms were recorded against each subject category
(note that terms can be assigned multiple subject categories).
Business
BS
74
Communication
CO
45
Community
CM
96
Culture
CU
79
Defence
DF
18
Economics
EC
35
Education
ED
251
Emergencies
EM
48
Employment
ET
111
Environment
EN
132
Finance
FN
91
General
GN
55
Geography
GE
17
Government
GV
85
Health
HL
204
Industry
IN
106
Information & Communications Technology
IT
46
Law
LW
117
Management
MG
22
Measurement
MS
7
Planning
PL
42
Politics
PO
51
Property
PR
49
Recreation
RC
72
Safety
SF
55
Sciences
SC
33
Society
SO
73
Technology
TC
24
Tourism
TO
42
Transport
TR
121
Regular checking and review throughout the Thesaurus build ensured that the
Thesaurus could grow in a managed and systemic way. Each node was
checked by at least one person apart from the person who developed the
terms, to ensure that key concepts were covered and structural problems were
immediately fixed if identified.
The Thesaurus remains in the MultiTES environment until it is scheduled to
be integrated within the CiTR accesspoint environment.
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4. Victoria Online Thesaurus – Maintenance
Version
control
The Victoria Online Thesaurus exists in three environments:
1. MultiTES Pro 2005 Database – primary source
2. Published and distributed version (available on the eGovernment
Resource Centre)
3. accesspoint environment
Changes to
the VO
Thesaurus
The VO Thesaurus will develop and grow over time, in response to changing
content on Victoria Online and changing patterns in user language. Any
changes will need to be reflected in all three environments. The following
outlines a proposal for managing changes in the VO Thesaurus.
Cataloguing
changes
within
MultiTES
New terms or changes to current thesaurus terms are likely to become
apparent during the cataloguing process. Victoria Online cataloguers may,
after appropriate consideration, add or amend terms to the VO Thesaurus
within the MultiTES environment. To monitor any changes, a regular report
of amendments will be generated from MultiTES and distributed to the
cataloguing personnel for review/comment.
Published VO
Thesaurus
Changes will be also reflected in the published version of the VO Thesaurus.
This will be updated on a biannual basis (January and July) from the primary
dataset within MultiTES.
accesspoint
environment
Changes should finally also be reflected in the accesspoint environment for
future cataloguing. This can be done by sending a change request to update
the thesaurus file with a new dataset exported from MultiTES. It is suggestd
that this could be done on a monthly basis, to be adjusted according to the
amount of changes that are being made.
General
maintenance
Within the MultiTES environment, periodic checks should also be made to
ensure ongoing data integrity. Apart from ongoing general qualitative review,
the following checks should be regularly performed:
check for orphaned terms – restructure if found
review of top terms – restructure if broader term is identifiable
check for preferred terms lacking subject codes – add codes
check for nonpreferred terms with subject codes – delete codes
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Bibliography
Bates, Marcia J. “After the Dot-Bomb : getting web information retrieval right this time” in
First Monday, v.7 n.7, July 1, 2002
http://www.firstmonday.org/issues/issue7_7/bates/index.html
Chief Technology Office. AGLS Victoria : metadata implementation manual. Version 2.1
December 2004.
Garshol, Lars Marius. Metadata? Thesauri? Taxonomies? Topic Maps! : Making sense of it
all. 26/10/2004
http://www.ontopia.net/topicmaps/materials/tm-vs-thesauri.html
IFocus. Multimedia Victoria. Victorian Online Gateway : Consumer research (RS-07) :
Phase 3 – Life events & groupings
Matthews, Brian, Miles, Alistair and Wilson, Michael. Modelling thesauri for the semantic
web. (no date)
http://www.w3c.rl.ac.uk/SWAD/thesaurus/tif/deliv81/final.html
Morville, Peter. Building a synonymous search index (thesaurus).Originally published
October 30, 1998 in Web Review magazine
http://semanticstudios.com/publications/web_architect/thesaurus.html
National Information Standards Organization (U.S.) ANSI/NISO Z39.19-2003 Guidelines
for the construction, format, and management of monolingual thesauri . Bethesda,
MD : NISO Press, 2003.
Paris First. Research Report : Content Definition (Version 1.0 Report – January 2002)
Publications on thesaurus construction and use – including some references to facet
analysis, taxonomies, ontologies, topic maps and related issues. Willpower
Information, 2005.
http://www.willpower.demon.co.uk/thesbibl.htm
Rosenfeld, L & Morville, P. Information architecture for the world wide web. 2nd ed.
Sebastopol CA : O’Reilly & Associates, 2002
Shiri, Ali Asghar and Revie, Crawford. “Thesauri on the Web : current developments and
trends” in Online Information Review v.24 n.4 2000, pp.273-279
http://dlist.sir.arizona.edu/archive/00000163/01/thesauri.pdf
Soergel, Dagobert, Lauser, Boris, Liang, Anita, Fisseha, Frehiwot, Keizer and Katz,
Johannes Kaiser. “Reengineering thesauri for new applications : AGROVOC
example”. In Journal of Digital Information, volume 4 issue 4; Article no.257;
2004-03-17.
http://jodi.ecs.soton.ac.uk/Articles/v04/i04/Soergel/
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Taxonomies and thesauri: a list of references and resources for public sector applications.
Published date: 01/03/2005.
http://www.govtalk.gov.uk/documents/taxonomies_and_thesauri.pdf
Tudhope, Douglas, Alani, Harith and Jones, Christopher. “Augmenting thesaurus
relationships : possibilities for retrieval” in Journal of Digital Information, volume
1, issue 8; Article no.41, 2001-02-05.
http://jodi.ecs.soton.ac.uk/Articles/v04/i04/Soergel/
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Appendix A – List of reference thesauri
Aquatic Sciences and Fisheries Thesaurus
http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/sebscc/special_issue/csa_thesaurus/pr.html
Australian Occupational Health and Safety Thesaurus. 3rd ed.
http://www.worksafe.gov.au/OHSInformation/LibraryServices/AOHST_e3.pdf
Australian Public Affairs Information Service (APAIS) Thesaurus
http://www.nla.gov.au/apais/thesaurus/search.html
Australian Thesaurus of Education Descriptors. 3rd ed.
http://cunningham.acer.edu.au/mulcgi/index.htm
Australian Transport Index Thesaurus
http://www.arrb.com.au/documents/libraryThesaurus.pdf?PHPSESSID=9acca0701
731dc13ee02289ba56ce0bf
Bioethics Thesaurus 1998 : Annotated Keywords
http://www.ruhr-uni-bochum.de/zme/Literatur/bioths99.htm
The British Columbia Thesaurus
http://aabc.bc.ca/aabc/bcthesaurus.pdf
DEH Thesaurus [Australian Government Department of the Environment and Heritage]
http://www.deh.gov.au/about/pubs/deh-thesaurus.pdf
European Multilingual Thesaurus on Health Promotion in 12 Languages - ENGLISH
http://www.hpmulti.net/pdf/english%20relations%20pdf.PDF
Eurovoc Thesaurus
http://europa.eu.int/celex/eurovoc/cgi/sga_doc?eurovoc_dif!SERVEUR/menu!prod
!MENU&langue=EN
Functions of New Zealand (FONZ) Thesaurus
http://www.e-government.govt.nz/nzgls/thesauri/fonz/fonz-2-30.pdf
Government of Canada Core Subject Thesaurus
http://en.thesaurus.gc.ca/these/thes_e.html
Headstart Thesaurus [early childhood education]
http://www.bmcc.edu/Headstart/Thesaurus/hsthes_a-b.htm
The Health and Ageing Thesaurus. 7th ed.
http://www.health.gov.au/internet/wcms/publishing.nsf/Content/healththesaurus.htm/$FILE/alista_i.pdf
http://www.health.gov.au/internet/wcms/publishing.nsf/Content/healththesaurus.htm/$FILE/alistj_z.pdf
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Municipal and Local Terms : an Addendum to the British Columbia Thesaurus
http://aabc.bc.ca/aabc/bcthesaurusaddendum.pdf
NASA Thesaurus
http://www.sti.nasa.gov/98Thesaurus/vol1.pdf
National Public Health Language (NPHL) Thesaurus
http://www.nphl.nhs.uk/
Schools Online Thesaurus (ScOT)
http://scot.curriculum.edu.au/default.htm
Subjects of New Zealand (SONZ) Thesaurus
http://www.e-government.govt.nz/nzgls/thesauri/sonz/sonz-1-30.pdf
Thesaurus of Australian Government Subjects (TAGS)
http://www.agimo.gov.au/__data/assets/file/21188/tags.pdf
Unesco Thesaurus
http://databases.unesco.org/thesaurus/
VOCED Thesaurus
http://www.voced.edu.au/thes.htm
Wideman Comparative Glossary of Project Management Terms v2.1
http://www.pmforum.org/library/glossary/index.htm
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1.2
Appendix B – VO Thesaurus Build Timetable/Roster
Thesaurus Category
(30)
Business
Communication
Community
Culture
Defence
Economics
Education
Emergencies
Employment
Environment
Finance
General
Geography
Government
Health
Industry
Information &
Communications
Technology
Law
Management
Measurement
Planning
Politics
Property
Recreation
Safety
Sciences
Society
Technology
Tourism
Transport
Thesaurus
Category Code
BS
CO
CM
CU
Resp.
SCHEDULE
AG
AG
AG
VB
AG-5 by 8/4
AG-14 by 29/4
AG-10 by 22/4
VB-11 by 29/4
9
9
9
9
DF
EC
ED
EM
ET
EN
FN
GN
GE
GV
HL
IN
IT
AG
AG
AG
AG
AG
VB
AG
AG
AG
VB
VB
AG
AG
AG-12 by 22/4
AG-8 by 8/4
AG-3 by 16/3
AG-1 by 8/3
AG-4 by 23/3
VB-9 by 22/4
AG-6 by 8/4
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
LW
MG
MS
PL
PO
PR
RC
SF
SC
SO
TC
TO
TR
VB
AG
AG
VB
VB
VB
VB
AG
VB
AG
AG
VB
VB
VB-5 by 15/4
VB-7 by 22/4
AG-9 by 8/4
AG-14 by 29/4
VB-8 by 29/4
AG-7 by 8/4
VB-2 by 8/4
VB-6 by 15/4
VB-3 by 8/4
VB-10 by 29/4
AG-2 by 8/3
VB-4 by 15/4
AG-11 by 22/4
AG-13 by 29/4
VB-12 by 29/4
VB-1by 22/3
Status
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
9
Start
Date
23/03/05
18/04/05
11/04/05
27/04/05
End
Date
08/04/05
22/04/05
18/04/05
29/04/04
QA
18/04/05
04/04/05
08/03/05
01/03/05
16/03/05
13/04/05
04/04/05
22/04/05
08/04/05
16/03/05
08/03/05
23/03/05
22/04/05
08/04/05
VB
VB
VB, KS
VB
VB
AG
VB
08/04/05
18/04/05
30/03/05
18/04/05
15/04/05
27/04/05
08/04/05
22/04/05
AG
AG
VB
VB
27/04/05
23/03/05
29/04/05
08/04/05
AG
VB
01/04/05
08/04/05
01/04/05
21/04/05
01/03/05
12/04/05
11/04/05
18/04/05
28/04/05
11/03/05
05/04/05
15/04/05
08/04/05
29/04/04
08/03/05
14/04/05
22/04/05
22/04/05
29/04/05
22/03/05
AG
AG
AG
AG
VB, KS
AG
VB
VB
VB
AG
VB
VB
VB
AG
Final
QA - KS
Comments
Can include heritage &
history
Includes agriculture
Includes sport
36
Thesaurus Development Project Report Version 1.2