Open hypermedia as a navigational interface to ontological information spaces

Abstract

Ontologies provide a powerful tool for distributed agent-based information systems. However, in their raw form they can be difficult for users to interact with directly. Different query architectures use structured query languages as an interface but these still require the users to have an expert understanding of the underlying ontologies. By using an Open Hypermedia model as an interface to an ontological information space, users can interact with such a system using familiar browsing and navigation techniques, which are translated into queries over the underlying information. Coupled with dynamic document generation, this allows complicated queries to be made without the user having to interact directly with the ontologies. Our key contribution is a notion of hypermedia links between concepts and queries within an ontological information space. This approach is demonstrated with a Dynamic CV application built around the SoFAR agent framework and the Fundamental Open Hypermedia Model (FOHM). In addition to abstracting the interface, Open Hypermedia allows alternative linkbases to be used to represent different “query recipes”, providing different views and navigational experiences to the user.