About SWED

SWED Frequently Asked Questions

The Project - The SWED directory - Using SWED and Copyright - Security & Privacy - Semantic Web - Technical Issues

The Project

What is SWAD-Europe?

SWAD Europe stands for Semantic Web Advanced Development Europe. It is a EU funded project that aims to "support W3C's Semantic Web initiative in Europe, providing targeted research, demonstrations and outreach to ensure Semantic Web technologies move into the mainstream of networked computing." Further details can be found on the SWAD-Europe web site: http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/Europe/
What makes SWED different from other portal or directory projects?

Probably the most fundamental difference is that in SWED, the information is stored and maintained by the supplying organisations. Each organisations and projects that have entries in the directory, store their own directory data on their web site, rather than centrally stored as is the case with traditional and existing approaches. The information is stored in a standard format called RDF (Resource Description Framework) is, like HTML (Hypertext Markup Language), an open standard, but whereas HTML tells machines how to present a page, RDF can encode much richer information, such as details about your organisation"

These simple differences lead to many advantages e.g. the maintenance effort is distributed across the whole community an so requires less resource, the information can be reused by others (as part of the Semantic Web), everyone that uses it receives updated information if that single file is updated by the owning organisation, etc, see Semantic Portals for more detail.
Why is Hewlett Packard involved in the project? and What does HP expect to get from this work?

HP has developed the Semantic Web Environmental Directory, as part of the SWAD-Europe project as a demonstration of practical semantic web applications. HP believes that the semantic web is an important future direction for the web. They would like to see it used and developed in real applications. The semantic web, like the web, is only effective if lots of people are putting information on it and linking that information together.

The more applications get deployed the more incentive there are for other applications to start to use the same technology and standards. They hope to see more semantic web applications developed and deplored, encouraged by the example of demonstrations like this one.
Which Environmental and Community Organisations are involved in the project?

From the beginning of the project we have been working with the Environment Council. The Environment Council produced the Who's Who in the Environment in the UK publications and databases in the 1990s and are interested the creation a new and more sustainable directory. As the project develops we will be working closely with the Environment Council to set up a group of interested organisations/projects that wish to take the pilot directory forward as a sustainable and valuable service.

We are also working with the Natural History Museum who are acting as a case study organisation for SWED - they are an organisation with particularly rich internal structure (departments and projects) and with many external links. Additionally we are working with them to extend the SWED data and system to include richer information about museum collections.

At a local level we have the support of a number of Bristol based voluntary organisations including VOSCUR (the main support agency for the community and voluntary sector in and around Bristol) and will be working with local groups to explore how a SWED type directory can be made as effective as possible for small groups at a local level.

If you are interested in finding our more about how to become involved in the future development of a SWED type directory or other information resource, please contact Paul Shabajee via our contacts page.

The SWED Prototype Directory

What is the difference between SWED and other web directories of environmental organisations?

The about SWED section of this web site includes details of why SWED is different from existing directories. If you are interested in a detailed description of the 'semantic web' approach used by SWED see the 'semantic portals' page in the about section.
When does the SWAD-Europe project end and how will the SWED web site keep going once the project ends?

The SWAD project ends in October 2004. The SWED web site is currently hosted by Hewlett Packard Labs in Bristol, UK. We are working closely with a group of organisations through the Environment Council to find a new host organisation for the SWED once the SWAD-Europe project ends.

We have every reason to believe that SWED or a SWED type web site will continue once the project ends.

Of course the SWED system has been designed so that anyone can set up and host a SWED style directory. The system can be customised to harvest and produce information resources based on any semantic web data including the SWED information files created by environmental organisations. The software is downloadable form our 'technical resources' page, and uses open source software and open technical standards, and so can be installed on any apache based server system.
What is the "Who's Who in the Environment in the UK" directory?

The Who's Who in the Environment directories provided detailed information about environmental organisations in the UK. There were four paper based directories; England (last published 1995), Scotland (last published 1996) , Northern Ireland (last published 1994) and Wales (last published 1995).

The organisations included voluntary sector and government organisations in the UK and excluded organisations based in the UK but whos major activity was based in other parts of the world.

The information included contact details, description of the organisations, their status (e.g. charity, trade association, ...), number of staff, whether they have volunteer opportunities, membership details and local branch details. They were originally created using support from external sponsors e.g. the England directory was supported by Esso (funded compilation, printing and distribution) and the Countryside Commission (funded distribution).

There was also a computer diskette version, including all of the paper based version (last produced in 1998) and that contained more comprehensive details in an searchable database.
Is SWED in competition with existing directories?

The SWED directory is part of a research prototype that is exploring new ways to create and maintain richly indexed information within communities of interest. In the case of the SWED the 'community' of people, organisations and projects with an active interest in the environment.

One of our key goals is to make it simpler for anyone to create a directory of organisations using the approach and technologies provided by the Semantic Web. To that end, we have developed a prototype opensource software toolkit (downloadable from our technical resources page) that can be used (freely) by anyone to create their own directory. And as the data about the organisations that are included in the directory is freely available on their own web sites the existing information itself is also free to use.

Being designed on Semantic Web principles - it is equally easy to create new data that can be added to the existing pool of information - see our semantic portals page. This means that other directory providers can use the basic information provided as part of the SWED directory information and add to it, to create a customised directory, perhaps focused on a particular aspect of environmental issues or a product or services directory. They might also add value to the data by including a some form of more comprehensive validation or accreditation.

It is hoped that SWED itself as a basic directory will continue past the end of the research project - see above for details.
How do I know the information in the directory is accurate?

The simple answer is that, as with any directory ultimately you cannot to 100% sure that the information is correct and you must verify that the information with the organisation or project itself.

However SWED information is provided by the organisations/projects themselves and they actually store and maintain that information themselves. That means that the risk of errors being introduced on part of the SWED itself are minimised. If you do spot an error please click on the 'Found a mistake?' link on the right hand side of the page. Fill in the simple form that asks for details of the mistake and, if necessary, we will pass the details on the organisation or project.
What do you define as an 'environmental organisations'?

We define 'environmental' organisation or project widely, much as the 'Who's Who in the Environment' directory did in the 1990s. An environmental organisation or project is one that is concerned with some aspect of the environment or has significant impact on the environment

However unlike 'Who's Who in the Environment', commercial as well as voluntary and public sector organisations and projects are included. We also include organisations that are based in the UK but whose work is mostly focused in other areas of the world.
How do we joining the SWED?

Visit our 'becoming involved' web pages to find out about joining or becoming involved in the directory.
What if we don't have our own Web site?

There should be no problem if your organisation or project does not have a web site where they can host the SWED directory information file. All you need to do is find another organisation to host the file for you. You may have a parent organisation or related projects or organisations that can help. Another option is a local or national networking organisation associated with your type of body, e.g. local voluntary sector support network. The SWED files are very small and will generate hardly any web traffic - they are only harvested by SWED once a day at most, so should not cause the host organisation any inconvenience.

Once you have found a place for your file, simply register it at that location as normal (see joining SWED for more information)

Using the SWED Data & Copyright

Who owns the copyright of the SWED data?

As with all data the copyright is owned, by default, by the creators of the information - in this case the organisations and projects themselves. However SWED is an example of a semantic web project - it is based on the idea of sharing and integrating information from across the web. And specifically SWED aims to make the information about environmental organisations/projects available to anyone that would like to use it (as part of the semantic web). That includes taking copies and re-publishing the information e.g. as part of a specialist directory.

So, under current copyright laws, we need to make sure that the anyone using the data has explicit permission to use the information from the copyright holders. To this end we have included a legal statement in the SWED data creation process and data files, that makes the permission to reuse the information explicit - this takes the following form.

"If you choose to make this RDF data available on your web site then any one who accesses it needs to be sure they are allowed to copy and use the data. Portal sites need to be sure they are allowed to include your published data in their directory. To make it clear that you give permission for this we ask you to grant the following licence, in favour of the party operating, administering and/or hosting a portal website. Accordingly, the following statement will be attached to the data to ensure the proper grant of the necessary permissions to anyone downloading your RDF data for the purpose of posting it on their website."

"THE LICENCE. In return for downloading and hosting the RDF data on your website, database or other data storage repository , we hereby grant to you an irrevocable licence to perform, in relation to the data provided in rdf format, any act otherwise restricted by copyright."

The 'licence' text itself, is embeded in the data (RDF) file that is stored by the organisation/project on their server (or that of a hosting organisation/project). It makes it explict that the data can be re-used in an unrestricted manner, by those who harvest it. This is similar to the evolving copyright initiatives associated with opensource and creative commons licences.
Can we use the SWED information on our own Web site?

Yes. The SWED project specifically aims to demonstrate how the semantic web approach can improve access to information and make information resources more maintainable and sustainable. The SWED data files give explicit permission to re-use the information for other purposes.
How do we find out what organisations have SWED RDF files and where they are located?

All organisations in the directory have RDF files that have been harvested. At this stage there is no easily accessible list of the locations of the files. However in the medium term we plan to make the harvested RDF data and locations of the files accessible in an appropriate form. If you wish to know more visit our contacts page to find out who to contact for your particular inquiry

Security & Privacy

What's to stop e-mail addresses being used for Spam?

As we indicate on the SWED data creation form, it is possible that those who produce spam e-mail will collect e-mail addresses from SWED and add them to spam lists. However SWED is just like any other web site and if the e-mail address you would enter in SWED is already available on the Web, it is likely that it will have already been captured.

However we do not recommend that you add personal e-mail addresses to SWED information, but use a 'general enquiries' e-mail address if your organisation has one. If you do not have, or do not want to enter an, e-mail address, make sure that you provide another means of contacting your organisation e.g. web site address, postal address or telephone number.
If people can re-use the SWED information, what's to stop them using the SWED data and adding false information?

The situation in which some creates their own web sites and provides false or erroneous information. The ease of re-use of SWED data does not change the basic situation.

Where the situation is more complex is where web sites harvest 3rd party information to add to their web-based information resources or directories.

For example a project might want to collate information about environmental organisations from a particular sector e.g. pollution control consultancies and their publications. They may harvest the basic contact/description information from SWED data, and use a 3rd party (external) organisation who specializes in pollution control publications to pull in the information about the publications. Clearly the project that collates the information must be sure that they trust the automatically harvested information from the 3rd party data. IF that 3rd party data contains false or inaccurate information it will appear on the projects web site.

This is essentially the same as any project collating information from multiple sources that use 3rd party information - for paper or web-based publications, i.e. it needs to be trusted or validated to the degree required for the particular application. Usually either 'trust' comes from the reputation of the source e.g. a well known or authoritative or definitive body or by formal agreements between data provider and user.

In the case of SWED we harvest information that organisations and projects assert about themselves and in the early demonstration data, other information that we (manually) collate ourselves - Any data that is on the SWED web site that is not from the original source (the organisations/projects themselves) is highlighted in the SWED interface, and the source of that data can be looked up. One advantage of the SWED approach is that it is possible to find the source file of any piece of data on the site.

However for a larger semantic web to work in the longer term, it is necessary that more automatic, and robust mechanisms are developed to enable validation of sources and asserting degrees and conditions of trust. This work is part of the semantic web development roadmap of the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C).

The Semantic Web

What is the Semantic Web?

See 'Semantic Web' on our glossary page.
What it RDF?

See 'RDF' on our glossary page.
Why do we need the Semantic Web? and Why isn't Google good enough?

The semantic web is often seen as being about finding information on the web more effectively. Which, while it is an important part of the goal, is not whole picture. Google and other search engines are very effective in helping us find answers to specific questions and finding web sites, for example, of major organisations or projects.

However there are limitations to traditional approaches - traditional search engines visit web pages and index them using the words that are contained in the pages. However they have no way of knowing what those words 'mean' or in what way they were used (e.g. 'vessel' might mean container, a sea going craft or blood vessel), even where the sense is known, the manner of use of of terms can be ambiguous. And of course names may refer to many different things, e.g. common human names (in the UK Smith or Jones) and places e.g. "West Street".

Traditional web search engines cannot distinguish between these meanings, uses or cases, because the information needed to do it (at least unless read by a human) is simply not available within the web page. The semantic web simply provides ways for authors of web pages and other web-based information to embed such information within the web page so that computers can 'known' what is being referred to. e.g. the Mr. Jones - with the following e-mail address or the term 'vessel' as referred to by the company 'boat builders inc.' or the place Bristol with the geographic coordinates of ... etc.). Each term, relationship and name can be given a unique identifier.

This 'disambiguation' means that not only can web searches be made more precise in their construction (e.g. give me information about the place ''West Street' at location ...) and response (e.g. by giving only results related to that place and ALL results related to that place that the system knows of) but also allows information to be joined or integrated in ways simply not possible previously. For example if one piece of information contains tourist information about a place and another pictures of that place, a computer program can easily pull those the two together. In the context of SWED this could work for organisations and their publications, their products or services or any other characteristic of them.
Why is using RDF better than using straight XML?

If you know of XML (eXtensible Markup Language) you may know that it was developed to make it easy to share structured web-based (and other) information such as library or product catalogues, holiday bookings or other information that might be held in a database. XML provides a way for those sharing, known structured, information to pass it between applications and their computer systems, so that they can inter-operate (work seamlessly) with the each other.

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Technical Issues

How can we create our own RDF file?

If you want to create your own SWED RDF file rather than use the SWED data creation form, probably the easiest way is to take the text of an existing SWED RDF file, like the one below, and use that as a template or simply replace the values in the text to those that you require. For a brief description of the SWED RDF file and a simple example see the semantic portals page.

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If you have any questions not answered here or would like more information about the SWED project visit our contacts page to find out who to contact for your particular inquiry.