The result of more than 15 years of collective research, Multimedia Ontology: Representation and Applications provides a theoretical foundation for understanding the nature of media data and the principles involved in its interpretation. The book presents a unified approach to recent advances in multimedia and explains how a multimedia ontology can

This comprehensive book draws together experts to explore how knowledge technologies can be exploited to create new multimedia applications, and how multimedia technologies can provide new contexts for the use of knowledge technologies. Thorough coverage of all relevant topics is given. The step-by-step approach guides the reader from fundamental enabling technologies of ontologies, analysis and reasoning, through to applications which have hitherto had less attention.

This book constitutes the refereed proceedings of the joint 6th International Semantic Web Conference, ISWC 2007, and the 2nd Asian Semantic Web Conference, ASWC 2007, held in Busan, Korea, in November 2007. The 50 revised full academic papers and 12 revised application papers presented together with 5 Semantic Web Challenge papers and 12 selected doctoral consortium articles were carefully reviewed and selected from a total of 257 submitted papers to the academic track and 29 to the applications track. The papers address all current issues in the field of the semantic Web, ranging from theoretical and foundational aspects to various applied topics such as management of semantic Web data, ontologies, semantic Web architecture, social semantic Web, as well as applications of the semantic Web. Short descriptions of the top five winning applications submitted to the Semantic Web Challenge competition conclude the volume.

This book covers in a great depth the fast growing topic of tools, techniques and applications of soft computing (e.g., fuzzy logic, genetic algorithms, neural networks, rough sets, Bayesian networks, and other probabilistic techniques) in the ontologies and the Semantic Web. The author shows how components of the Semantic Web (like the RDF, Description Logics, ontologies) can be covered with a soft computing methodology.

A comprehensive theory-based approach to the treatment of text meaning in natural language processing applications.

Metadata research has emerged as a discipline cross-cutting many domains, focused on the provision of distributed descriptions (often called annotations) to Web resources or applications. Such associated descriptions are supposed to serve as a foundation for advanced services in many application areas, including search and location, personalization, federation of repositories and automated delivery of information. Indeed, the Semantic Web is in itself a concrete technological framework for ontology-based metadata. For example, Web-based social networking requires metadata describing people and their interrelations, and large databases with biological information use complex and detailed metadata schemas for more precise and informed search strategies.There is a wide diversity in the languages and idioms used for providing meta-descriptions, from simple structured text in metadata schemas to formal annotations using ontologies, and the technologies for storing, sharing and exploiting meta-descriptions are also diverse and evolve rapidly. In addition, there is a proliferation of schemas and standards related to metadata, resulting in a complex and moving technological landscape — hence, the need for specialized knowledge and skills in this area.The Handbook of Metadata, Semantics and Ontologies is intended as an authoritative reference for students, practitioners and researchers, serving as a roadmap for the variety of metadata schemas and ontologies available in a number of key domain areas, including culture, biology, education, healthcare, engineering and library science.

Ontology Learning for the Semantic Web explores techniques for applying knowledge discovery techniques to different web data sources (such as HTML documents, dictionaries, etc.), in order to support the task of engineering and maintaining ontologies. The approach of ontology learning proposed in Ontology Learning for the Semantic Web includes a number of complementary disciplines that feed in different types of unstructured and semi-structured data. This data is necessary in order to support a semi-automatic ontology engineering process. Ontology Learning for the Semantic Web is designed for researchers and developers of semantic web applications. It also serves as an excellent supplemental reference to advanced level courses in ontologies and the semantic web.

With the current changes driven by the expansion of the World Wide Web, this book uses a different approach from other books on the market: it applies ontologies to electronically available information to improve the quality of knowledge management in large and distributed organizations. Ontologies are formal theories supporting knowledge sharing and reuse. They can be used to explicitly represent semantics of semi-structured information. These enable sophisticated automatic support for acquiring, maintaining and accessing information. Methodology and tools are developed for intelligent access to large volumes of semi-structured and textual information sources in intra- and extra-, and internet-based environments to employ the full power of ontologies in supporting knowledge management from the information client perspective and the information provider. The aim of the book is to support efficient and effective knowledge management and focuses on weakly-structured online information sources. It is aimed primarily at researchers in the area of knowledge management and information retrieval and will also be a useful reference for students in computer science at the postgraduate level and for business managers who are aiming to increase the corporations' information infrastructure. The Semantic Web is a very important initiative affecting the future of the WWW that is currently generating huge interest. The book covers several highly significant contributions to the semantic web research effort, including a new language for defining ontologies, several novel software tools and a coherent methodology for the application of the tools for business advantage. It also provides 3 case studies which give examples of the real benefits to be derived from the adoption of semantic-web based ontologies in "real world" situations. As such, the book is an excellent mixture of theory, tools and applications in an important area of WWW research. * Provides guidelines for introducing knowledge management concepts and tools into enterprises, to help knowledge providers present their knowledge efficiently and effectively. * Introduces an intelligent search tool that supports users in accessing information and a tool environment for maintenance, conversion and acquisition of information sources. * Discusses three large case studies which will help to develop the technology according to the actual needs of large and or virtual organisations and will provide a testbed for evaluating tools and methods. The book is aimed at people with at least a good understanding of existing WWW technology and some level of technical understanding of the underpinning technologies (XML/RDF). It will be of interest to graduate students, academic and industrial researchers in the field, and the many industrial personnel who are tracking WWW technology developments in order to understand the business implications. It could also be used to support undergraduate courses in the area but is not itself an introductory text.

"This book addresses the Semantic Web from an operative point of view using theoretical approaches, methodologies, and software applications as innovative solutions to true knowledge management"--Provided by publisher.

Broad in scope, Semantic Multimedia Analysis and Processing provides a complete reference of techniques, algorithms, and solutions for the design and the implementation of contemporary multimedia systems. Offering a balanced, global look at the latest advances in semantic indexing, retrieval, analysis, and processing of multimedia, the book features the contributions of renowned researchers from around the world. Its contents are based on four fundamental thematic pillars: 1) information and content retrieval, 2) semantic knowledge exploitation paradigms, 3) multimedia personalization, and 4) human-computer affective multimedia interaction. Its 15 chapters cover key topics such as content creation, annotation and modeling for the semantic web, multimedia content understanding, and efficiency and scalability. Fostering a deeper understanding of a popular area of research, the text: Describes state-of-the-art schemes and applications Supplies authoritative guidance on research and deployment issues Presents novel methods and applications in an informative and reproducible way Contains numerous examples, illustrations, and tables summarizing results from quantitative studies Considers ongoing trends and designates future challenges and research perspectives Includes bibliographic links for further exploration Uses both SI and US units Ideal for engineers and scientists specializing in the design of multimedia systems, software applications, and image/video analysis and processing technologies, Semantic Multimedia Analysis and Processing aids researchers, practitioners, and developers in finding innovative solutions to existing problems, opening up new avenues of research in uncharted waters.