Organic Data Science through a Semantic Wiki

Organic Data Science through a Semantic Wiki

To structure the content of this wiki, we use a semantic wiki framework. We use an extension of Semantic MediaWiki that enables contributors to use structured semantic properties to describe the contents of the wiki.

One way in which this wiki structures content is though pre-defined categories. Pages can have special categories, which gives the wiki pages a pre-defined semantic structure. Special categories include Task, Answer, and Data.

In addition, each page has a section called "Structured Properties", where contributors can specify properties and values of the topic of the page. Any contributor can define new properties on the fly. Any contributor can change an existing property by one that is used elsewhere, effectively normalizing the use of the property across pages and therefore across objects. Each category of pages has different kinds of structured properties, sometimes organized into sections which are highlighted in a different color. To add a structured property, simply click the "Add" button in that section. We suggest you look at other pages and learn by looking at how they are structured.

Another extension in this wiki is that contributor credit is tracked and shown. At the bottom of each page, the contributors to that page are shown together with the details of their contributions to that page. Contributors can also have their own pages, which include any background information they wish to share, and where the edits that they have made are automatically summarized and shown.

• An example of a task page: Document PIHM Model
• An example of a data page: knb-lter-ntl.87.8
• An example of a researcher page: Jordan Read
• An example of a model software page: PIHM Software

A great way to start is to create your own page! Just type your name on the "Search" box, agree to create a page, save it empty, and then add properties imitating the example researcher page above.

Using Structured Content to Dynamically Create Sections of Wiki Pages

Those properties can then be used to answer queries that aggregate automatically those properties and pages. Below are some examples of how a query can be stated using those structured properties, and the automatically generated table that answers the query. These queries can be used to create dynamically generated content.

	Author	Software license	Language
Delft3d	Deltares systems
GLM Software	Casper Boon Louise Bruce Matt Hipsey		C
IPH-ECO	David da Motta Marques
PIHM Software	Gopal Bhatt Lorne Leonard Xuan Yu Chris Duffy Mukesh Kumar	GPL v2	C C++

	Expertise	Affiliation
Chris Duffy	Hydrology	Pennsylvania State University
Craig Snortheim	Hydrodynamic modeling
David da Motta Marques	Hydrology Hydrodynamic modeling	Universidade Federal do Rio Grande do Sul
Jordan Read	Hydrodynamic modeling Physical limnology	Center for Integrated Data Analytics U.S. Geological Survey
Matt Hipsey	Ecosystem modeling Hydrodynamic modeling	University of Western Australia
Michael Pace		University of Virginia
Patricia Soranno	Landscape limnology	Michigan State University
Paul Hanson	Carbon cycling	Center For Limnology University of Wisconsin - Madison
Steve Jepsen		University of California Merced
Tom Harmon		University of California Merced
Xuan Yu		Pennsylvania State University
Yolanda Gil	AI planning and collaborative problem solving Workflows Semantic Web Semantic wikis Social computing	Information Sciences Institute University of Southern California

Accessing Structured Content Externally

The structured content in this semantic wiki is represented with the W3C RDF semantic representation standard. This allows others to access and import the content of this wiki into their applications. There is extensive documentation about this API here.

How to Add Text to a Wiki Page

In addition to structured properties, this wiki also allows adding regular wiki text and content. When editing, and before adding any text, click on the "Save Page" button at the bottom. After that select a category. Then you can either: 1) add structured properties by clicking on the "Add" button, or 2) add text and figures as in any other wiki by clicking on the "Edit" button at the top right. To format text and figures, see the Quick Guide to Using a Wiki, or the detailed User's Guide.