Drupal and semantic web

& Web 3.0

Web 3.0, variously called the semantic web, web of data or linked data web, is something that I, like many working in information technology, web development, information science, etc., am compelled to follow. Actually, coming from a library & information science background, I am keenly interested in the whole idea of a web of data.

Some friends of mine are much further along in actually implementing so-called linked data in their projects - see 'Wikipedia as controlled Vocabulary.' I'm not sure I'm "allowed" to interchange all of these concepts - I've been reading about the semantic web for about 4-5 years now and still struggle to explain it to people in a simple, jargonless way. So, I've just started playing with the concepts and thinking creatively about them and have thus become a bit less restrained in my thinking about something that really isn't that mysterious. I think of it using the following simplified equation:

Semantic Web = Web of data + Linking data

In other words, right now the web is a web of pages (mostly .html). Those pages are connected by links. But, those pages contain loads of data, many uniuquely identifiable pieces of data representing concepts like "Barack Obama" and "Wimbledon." If we could "meaningfully" mark up data in all those pages, we could link it together better and run more complex queries against it - the web as a giant database. (the Tim Berners-Lee message)

So, it occurred to me the other day that the best way to actually get my hands "dirty" in using things like RDFa and SPARQL is via Drupal. We are now roughly 6 months into our Drupal implementation, about which I have written loads of posts via this blog (See tags: Drupal and Weekly Drupal). We will be finishing up our programming and configuration of Drupal and migrating and tagging content with taxonomies we're in the process of writing over the next 2-4 months. What better to be thinking about possibly adding semantic mark-up (RDFa) to our content?

Luckily, I won't be stabbing in the dark on this one. There is already a large movement afoot in the Drupal community in this area. Notably:

• Dries' 2008 Drupalcon presentation (beginning around minute 37 he discusses semantic web and Drupal including RDF)
• There's a Semantic Web Drupal group
• Post by Dries on 'Drupal, semantic web and search'
• Modules such as RDF, RDF CCK, SPARQL,  RDF SPARQL Endpoint and others
• A host of discussions and other resources on drupal.org

But, and it's a big BUT, I still find it slightly daunting to get started. However, I suspect, like much surrounding the semantic web, learning by doing might be the best route to take. I happily accept suggestions or tips, however :-) ...