Data picking Linked Data: enabling users to create faceted browsers

Abstract

Despite the massive amount of data on the Web in Linked Data format it remains, however, difficult to explore, aggregate and consume this data. The access barrier is particularly higher for users with little or no technical experience. End users, with a vested interest in data but little technical expertise, typically rely on simple tools, such as spreadsheets, to store and analyze data. On the other side, publishers can’t always model or republish their data to appeal to every particular user group. In this paper we report on our attempt to lower this barrier. We suggest that both parties, publishers and users, can benefit from tools which allow them to quickly exchange data by (1) allowing the publisher to quickly mash up slices of different sources of data centered around a Despite the massive amount of data on the Web in Linked Data format it remains, however, difficult to explore, aggregate and consume this data. The access barrier is particularly higher for users with little or no technical experience. End users, with a vested interest in data but little technical expertise, typically rely on simple tools, such as spreadsheets, to store and analyze data. On the other side, publishers can’t always model or republish their data to appeal to every particular user group. In this paper we report on our attempt to lower this barrier. We suggest that both parties, publishers and users, can benefit from tools which allow them to quickly exchange data by (1) allowing the publisher to quickly mash up slices of different sources of data centered around a particular topic of user interest and (2) allow the user to manipulate facets of this data and export it in a familiar format. To facilitate this we employ the Data Picker, a tool for the mSpace faceted browser that allows publishers of Linked Data to quickly set up a faceted explorer from multiple data sources, which employ a SPARQL endpoint. One of main advantages of this approach is that it is easy to assemble a spreadsheet from several different sources thus utilizing the integrative properties of Linked Data while outputting it in a format familiar to the end user. Once the faceted browser is set up around a particular subject, the user is free to manipulate the fields by selecting the facets and subsequently generate the spreadsheet, allowing the user to carry on additional tasks. We tested the tool on our dataset of UK Public Sector Information (PSI) Linked Data using a number of test scenarios, which we set up as interesting questions requiring multiple sources of data to answer.

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ORCID for m.c. schraefel: orcid.org/0000-0002-9061-7957

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