PID-44

Semantic Wiki as an Integrated Content and Metadata Management System
Hendry Muljadi and Hideaki Takeda
National Institute of Informatics
Research Center for Testbeds and Prototyping
2-1-2, Hitotsubashi, Chiyoda-ku, Tokyo, Japan
hendry@nii.ac.jp, takeda@nii.ac.jp
Abstract
This paper describes a Semantic MediaWiki, aMediaWiki extended to include the ideas of Semantic Web. The proposed Semantic MediaWiki
works as an integrated system for content management and metadata management.

1

Introduction

In the increasing interest in the Semantic Web, more andmore Semantic Web applications are being developed. Oneof the current main issues for the Semantic Web applications’development is the simplicity and user-friendliness for theend users, especially for people with non-IT background.
On the other hand, in the context of collaboration on theweb, Wiki has proven itself to be a simple and user-friendlyinterface. For example, the community of Wikipedia.org, thefree content encyclopedia is becoming larger and larger.
There have been more than 13,000 people who gave theircontributions, either by creating or editing articles inWikipedia. So, it is normal to make an assumption that anextended Wiki will be useful for the development of a simple
and easy-to-use Semantic Web application.
This paper presents a Semantic MediaWiki 1 . Semantic
MediaWiki is a MediaWiki extended to enable the collaborative editing of metadata according to simple RDF statement.

2

Semantic Extension of MediaWiki

2.1 MediaWiki
MediaWiki is a Wiki software that is written in PHP and uses
MySQL database. It is a very useful tool for collaborative
content management and is being used to run the Wikipedia
and also other encyclopedia and dictionary sites.
MediaWiki also has a category management function thatallows a Wiki page under the namespace (“Category:”) to be
used as a metadata. This function allows the user to createclass-sub-class relation and class-instance relation of Wikipages. In other words, MediaWiki has the capability to1

Our current prototype is accessible fromhttp://www.semanticwiki.jp/

manage contents as well as metadata in a separate way, and to
manage the relation between contents and metadata. However, this category management function is not able to construct RDF triples, the building blocks of the Semantic Web.
In a MediaWiki environment, it is easy to make an RDF
resource, since a Wiki page always has a URL, e.g.
http://hostname/ wiki/pagename, and this URL can be used
as a URI of an RDF resource. So, constructing RDF triples ina MediaWiki environment can be done by enabling the construction of labeled links [Takeda and Muljadi, 2005]. The
labeled link represents the RDF property that links the RDF
subject with its object.

2.2 Semantic MediaWiki
Using the existing category management function as a reference, a new namespace (“Term:”) is created. A new table isalso created in the Wiki database to deal with the newnamespace. Wiki pages under this new namespace are being
enabled to use the labeled links. The wiki syntax is[[term:target_page|property]]. The RDF triple will be as
follow. <source_page> <property> <target_page>. Thus,
RDF triples can be constructed in the Semantic MediaWiki.
Each time the wiki syntax is used, the wiki engine willstore the RDF triple into the new table in MySQL database.
Figure 1 shows the example of the Wiki syntax writing of theRDF triples.
Semantic MediaWiki as an extension of MediaWiki has
the benefit of having all the functions available in MediaWiki
as a content management system, and by enabling the writingof labeled link, RDF triples can be constructed. Thus, Semantic MediaWiki can also be used as an editor of metadata
according to simple RDF statement. As shown in Figure 2,
Semantic MediaWiki is an integrated system for content
management and metadata management.

Figure 1: Writing RDF triples in Semantic MediaWiki

PID-44
tions of terms. Thus, Semantic MediaWiki is useful for thecollaborative editing of contents and metadata according tosimple RDF statement.

(Extended) MediaWiki
Metadata Managementisa
isalabel-alabel-c
isa
isa
label-b

Extension ofMediaWiki

4 Related Work

Figure 2: Semantic MediaWiki as an integrated system forcontent management and metadata management

There are some other Semantic Wikis being proposed [Tazzoli, 2004] [Aumueller, 2005]. SHAWN, a semantic wiki
that is proposed in [Aumueller, 2005] is a well-designed
system with the similar purpose to our system. But it is designed to serve as a metadata management system, ratherthan as an integrated system for content management andmetadata management, as the Semantic MediaWiki (seeFigure 2).

35 Conclusion

Content Management

Demonstration

In this section, we show a sample use of Semantic MediaWiki as a collaborative content and metadata editor for aJapanese biodictionary development. Currently, we use MediaWiki 1.3.11 as the base of the Semantic MediaWiki.
A new Wiki page can be created by directly writing theWiki page name on the browser, e.g. http://localhost/wiki/
Term:biology_term. Figure 3 shows a Wiki page of a Japanese biology term. Currently, we have about 1,000 pages asterms in the biodictionary on our system.

Semantic MediaWiki is proposed as an extension of MediaWiki that is able to write labeled links to construct RDFtriples. It is a very simple software and as one tries to use thissoftware, one may enjoy a visible editing of Wiki pages’
relations. As it also inherits all the functions available inMediaWiki, it is a useful tool for the collaborative editing ofcontents and metadata according to simple RDF statements.
However, it is also true to say that Semantic MediaWiki
could only handle simple RDF statements. It cannot handle
blank node, since a Wiki page should have a name. Further
work needs to be done to solve this problem. Another further
works that need to be done are enabling Semantic MediaWiki
to import RDF statement from external sources, to handle
RDFS, and also to construct the inference function within theWiki environment or by integrating Semantic MediaWiki
with external application.

Acknowledgments
writing RDF triples→property→target_page

Figure 3: Wiki page of a biology term in the biodictionary

source_page→target_page

Figure 4: The display of the property page
There are three RDF properties used in this biodictionary:Synonym, English and English Synonym. Synonym is usedto link a Japanese biology term with its synonym Japaneseterm. English is used to link a term with its direct translation’s English term, while English Synonym is used to link aterm with its English term’s synonym. Figure 4 shows thedisplay of the property page. The list of terms which use theRDF property is displayed on the property page. The property pages can be used as a quick reference for seeing rela-The research presented in this paper is a part of “the Development of the New Generation BioPortal Project” which isfunded by the Special Coordination Funds for Promoting
Science and Technology from the Ministry of Education,
Culture, Sport, Science and Technology, Japan. Our special
thanks also to A.Fujiyama, H.Sugawara, S.Miyazaki,
A.Kitamoto, J.Araki, T.Ito, S.Kawamoto, S.M.Demiya,S.Kobayashi, Y.Shirai, N.Ichiyoshi, T.Abe, T.Gojobori, andY.Mizuta.

References[Aumueller, 2005] D.Aumueller. Semantic authoring andretrieval within a Wiki. In Proc.of 2nd ESWC, Heraklion,Greece. May-June 2005.
[Takeda and Muljadi, 2005] H.Takeda and H.Muljadi. Towards Semantic MediaWiki. In Proc. of the 9th Semantic
Web and Ontology SIG, Atami, Japan, March 2005.
Japanese Society for Artificial Intelligence. (in Japanese).
[Tazzoli et al.,2004] R.Tazolli, P.Castagna, and S.E. Campanini. Towards a Semantic Wiki Wiki Web. In Poster
Abstracts of the 3rd ISWC, Hiroshima, Japan. November
2004.

PID-44
Semantic Wiki as an Integrated Content and Metadata Management System
Demo Explanation
1Introduction

We will demonstrate how Semantic MediaWiki can be used
as a collaborative content and metadata editor for the Japanese biodictionary development. The current Semantic MediaWiki uses MediaWiki 1.3.11 as its base Wiki engine, anduses PHP 4.3.11 and MySQL 4.0.24.

2

Demonstration

Using Semantic MediaWiki, a Wiki page can be created bydirectly writing the Wiki page name on the browser, e.g.
http://localhost/wiki/ Term:biology_term.
Figure 1 shows the editing box of the Wiki page. There arethree RDF properties used in this biodictionary: Synonym,
English, and English Synonym. The Wiki syntax:[[term:target_page|property]] is used to write RDF triples.
As shown in Figure 2, the labeled link relation will bedisplayed on the source_page as follows.
-> property -> target_page
By clicking the target_page link, the target_page will becreated automatically. As shown in Figure 3, on the target_page, the relation will be automatically displayed asfollows.
<- property <- source_page
By clicking the link that represents the RDF property, theproperty page will be created automatically. As shown inFigure 4, on the property page, all triples that use the property
will be listed. The property pages can be used as a quickreference for seeing relations of terms.

3

Summary

Semantic MediaWiki is proposed as an extension of MediaWiki that is able to write labeled links to construct RDFtriples. It is a very simple software and as one tries to use thissoftware, one may enjoy a visible editing of Wiki pages’
relations. As it also inherits all the functions available inMediaWiki, it is a useful tool for the collaborative editing ofcontents and metadata according to simple RDF statements.

→property→target_page

Figure 2: The display of the source_page<-property<-source_pageFigure 3: The display of the target_page

source_page→target_page

Figure 4: The display of the property page[[term:target_page|property]]

Figure 1: Editing Box of the Wiki page