agent markup languages, xml and the semantic web john flynn bbn technologies jflynn@bbn
DESCRIPTION
Agent Markup Languages, XML and the Semantic Web John Flynn BBN Technologies [email protected] June 14, 2001. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. *. - PowerPoint PPT PresentationTRANSCRIPT
202020001980
**** **
* * **** **
* * **** **
* ***** **
* *
* ***
*****
** *
* ***
*
**
**
***
* ***
*****
** *
* ***
*
**
**
***
* ***
*****
** *
* ***
*
**
**
***
* ***
*****
** *
* ***
*
**
**
***
• Cars• Airplanes• Tanks
• Movies• TV shows• Ships
* ***
*****
** *
* ***
*
**
**
***
Internet WorldWideWebXML
SemanticWeb
“In 30 years e-commerce will have become second nature. Lifelike, intelligent virtual assistants will be performing most routine transactions and simple negotiations electronically on our behalf. More technological change will have taken place in that period than during the entire twentieth century, and the curve will continue to steepen exponentially into the foreseeable future.”
Ray Kurzweil
What Is An Agent?
• Software module• Intended to act as a proxy for you
in some way• May be:
– Tightly controlled – Autonomous– Mobile
Why Is This Important?
• Humans work sequentially• Agents work in parallel and 24x7• Therefore, agents can be a major
productivity multiplier
Web Trends• Web is evolving from a provider of documents and images (information retrieval) • To a provider of services
• Web service discovery -Find me an airline service that offers flights to Singapore • Web service execution -Buy me “Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone” at
www.amazon.com
• Web service selection, composition and interoperation -Make my travel arrangements for my Internet World conference trip
• Both retrieval and services lend themselves to agent technologies
Problems
• Average Web searches examine only 25% of available information
• Web searches return a lot of unwanted information
• Information content of the Web doubles approximately every six months
• Problem continues to worsen as Web grows
Why Don’t We Have Agents Today?
• Information on the World Wide Web is based on HTML
• HTML is intended only for the visual presentation of information for humans to understand
• The best you can do is some form of word lookup
• There is no syntactic, semantic or logic description of the information
• Information is not machine readableAlgol = Ship, Star, Computer Language?
XML• World Wide Web Consortium (W3C)
standard• Provides important solution to syntax
problem and simple semantics and schemas:
<SSN>444-23-2656</SSN>• Now we can describe the meaning of words• Many applications of XML appearing:
– Geographic Markup Language (GML)– Extensible rights Markup Language (XrML)– Chemical Markup Language (CML)
Problem: Limited semantics and ontology
DARPA Agent Markup Language
• Builds on top of XML and RDF• Provides rich ontology
representation• Key starting point for W3C
Semantic Web activity• Future releases will provide logic
and rules capabilities
Problem: Tools to help create DAML ontologies, markup, and to facilitate access are still emerging
EXAMPLES<html> <head> <TITLE>Fred Jones</TITLE> </head><body> <H1>Information About Fred Jones</H1><P>Fred Jones is in the U.S. Air Force. He is a Captain stationed at AFRL. </P> </body> </html>
HTML
<person><name>Fred Jones</name><employer>U.S. Air Force</employer><station>AFRL</station><rank>Captain</rank></person>
XML<rdf:RDF xmlns:rdf="http://www.w3.org/1999/02/22-rdf-syntax-ns#" xmlns:daml="http://www.daml.org/2001/03/daml+oil#" xmlns:dod="http://www.dod.mil/personnel#" xmlns:af="http://www.af.mil/personnel#" xmlns:afrl="http://www.rl.af.mil/personnel#" <dod:Officer rdf:ID="fsmith"> <dod:givenName>Fred</dod:givenName> <dod:surname>Smith</dod:surname> <dod:service rdf:resource="http://www.dod.mil/services#AirForce"/> <af:rank rdf:resource="http://www.af.mil/personnel#Captain"/> <af:station rdf:resource="http://www.af.mil/stations#AFRL_Rome"/>
<daml:equivalentTo rdf:resource="ssn:123-45-6789"/> </dod:Officer></rdf:RDF>
DAML
DAML Status• DAML ontology language specification
released • http://www.daml.org provides public
Web site with DAML information• 18 top-level research teams are
developing DAML technology– Including Tim Berners-Lee (creator of web)– Dan Connolly (key developer of XML)
• Supported by W3C their new Semantic Web Activity
Conclusions
• DAML has the potential to revolutionize the way we use the Web
• As the Semantic Web infrastructure grows it will result in major improvements in human access to information
• Agents will act as real functional proxies for people and greatly increase their productivity
Vision: The Semantic Web
Buy CarBuy TV
Find Job
Get Info
AirlineTicket
FindRestaurant