Daniel’s Blog

SemanticBible Linked Data: Version Alpha 1

I am very very pleased to announce something which I have been working on for a while which is the transformation of SemanticBible into Linked Data. Please be aware that this a very early version at the moment, and so if you see it break when you are looking around then I’m probably improving and enhancing it.

More information (and recent update information) is available on the Linked Data SemanticBible about page. But here’s a quote from it for you:

SemanticBible is an online Semantic Web version of the Bible, it has lots of facts and figures about the Christian sacred texts. Please do have a browse around.

A Brief History

SemanticBible started life as a project by Sean Boisen over at SemanticBible.com, but Daniel Lewis and his colleagues at OpenLink Software decided to help Sean out by providing a Linked Data based approach. The outcome was this service.

Starting URIs:

• http://semanticbible.openlinksw.com/bible/cgi : The Composite Gospel : holds information about the stories in the Gospels
• http://semanticbible.openlinksw.com/bible/NTIndividuals :New Testament Individuals : holds information about people and places referenced in the New Testament
• http://semanticbible.openlinksw.com/ontology/cgi : The Composite Gospel Ontology : the vocabulary for describing the stories in the Gospel
• http://semanticbible.openlinksw.com/ontology/NTNames : The New Testament Names Ontology : The vocabulary for describing the people and places referenced in the New Testament

As I said before, do expect it to break randomly…. but if it seems like theres something not quite right, or if you have any feature requests that you wish to add then do email my work email ( dlewis[at]openlinksw[dot]com ) or skype me ( daniel.lewis ).

We’re only one piece in a very very large interconnected puzzle

Watch “Pale Blue Dot“

I had evolution setup for a week now, and on Friday I decided to install the evolution-rss plugin which is an RSS and ATOM newsreader built into evolution. The plugin (without me being aware of it until today) stopped me from receiving emails (so I apologies if anyone has sent me an email to my work email address ( dlewis at openlinksw dot com) over the weekend and I haven’t received/responded). I’ve now uninstalled the evolution-rss plugin and I seem to be receiving email fine now, including those during the weekend.

Setup:

• 64 bit processor
• Ubuntu 8.04 Hardy Heron
• Evolution 2.22.3.1
• evolution-rss 0.0.8

It upsets me greatly that I have to provide you with this news. Pete and I have had to cancel the BarCampOxford because of bad luck, we were so close to getting organisation completely done. Here is the message that Pete is passing on to every one:

Hiya.
It is with a heavy heart that I must announce the cancellation of Barcamp Oxford on September 20-21. Here’s why:

i) the primary sponsor, who we were in the final stages of negotiation with (and who were ready to pay for 90% of everything), have ceased trading and brought the administrators in. Having talked with the administrators, there is no money. For anything. Evidently the company in question were VC-funded and blew too much money without keeping track.
ii) the secondary sponsor, who were initially willing to be a primary sponsor until they had marketing cutbacks, have had further marketing cutbacks and are now unable to assist with the current economic climate.

These are the two main reasons. A third reason was restrictions of internet access at the venue itself, not a deal breaker by any stretch, but the absence of wireless and an understandably well-controlled IT policy at the college itself was too big a mountain to climb with the other factors.

So, Barcamp Oxford in its current form is off, and I am hereby passing the baton to anyone who wants to take it and run with it. I am shortly to start discussions of a similar camp-style event in Abingdon (down the road, OX14), and if anything comes of that, I will communicate to you accordingly.

For anyone who is planning a camp-style event in Oxford, you have my best wishes - I am more than happy to share experiences if you want some tips. I can say that the venue, Manor Road, were by far the nicest, most co-operative people I’ve dealt with at Oxford venues, and the sponsors, until they went quiet, were very progressive thinking and very open to ideas.

With that, I wish you a good week.

best;

Pete
(Organiser)

If you’re still interested in attending a BarCamp or Unconference then these events are running from September until the end of the year (2008):

• Bristol Knowledge Unconference
• BathCamp 
• BarCampLondon5
• SocialMediaCampLondon
• Be2Camp (London)

Yay, I’ve got my new Linux based PC all setup in my house now. I’ve just taken this picture (which is a little blurry):

Current setup:

• Processor: Intel Core 2 Quad 64-bit 2.4GHz (Energy Efficient)
• Motherboard: Asus P5N-E SLI 650i (on-board audio circuit, on-board gigabit network circuit)
• RAM: 4GB DDR2 with Heat Spreader
• Processor Cooler: Arctic Cooling Freezer 7
• Disc Drive: Optiarc 20x DVD RW/DL/RAM SATA
• Hard Drive: Samsung 750GB (32MB Cache, 7200RPM) SATA
• Graphics: nVidia GeForce 7300LE on a Microstar International PCI-E Card (256MB GDDR with 512 TurboCache, 450MHz Core Clock) (VGA, DVI and HDTV Output)
• Case: Antler ATX Midi Tower with 350w PSU (white) (in-built card readers and usb & firewire ports). (the blue bit is the power light which flashes red when the hard drive is in use)
• Wireless Keyboard and Mouse (comes with the case)… also have my Mac mouse plugged in.
• Monitor: LG Studioworks 563N CRT
• OS: Ubuntu Linux 8.04 (Hardy Heron) with AIGLX and Beryl on Gnome. (Cube is currently active, and also playing a Steve Vai DVD using VLC)

Things I haven’t got yet, but will do in the near future

• A TFT Monitor (preferably 19inch)
• Office chair (not leather) (at the moment I’m working on a dining table chair)
• Mouse mat (at the moment I’m using a piece of paper, which has variable results with laser mice)

Other things in the picture:

• Ibanez GIO Electric Guitar
• Light from my large fish tank
• Apple MacBook (Intel Core 2 Duo 2GHz) with Mac OS X 10.5
• Book: Artificial Intelligence: A Modern Approach (2nd Ed) by Russell and Norvig
• Remote control for my iPod speaker dock
• Sony Ericsson P1i
• TP-Link Router (with WiFi)
• my watch (made by animnal)
• beki’s old desk
• Steve Vai: Live at the Astoria London DVD

I quickly zipped up a poster for the “Bristol Knowledge Unconference“. It’s available as a PDF by clicking the following link:

Bristol Knowledge Unconference 2008 Poster

Feel free to download the file, print it out and put it up at your workplace (providing it’s appropriate).

Feel free to email me if you have any questions.

Reminder:

• When: Friday 5th September 2008
• Where: eOffice Bristol, Prudential Buildings, Wine Street, Bristol, BS1 2PH
• Cost: Free
• Sign-up: http://knowledgeunconference.eventwax.com/bristol-knowledge-unconference (at the time of writing there are tickets available, get yours now)

In the past I’ve used the term “Universe of Discourse” in order to sum up the true meaning of Linked Data Spaces. Well, I’ve recently come across a great saying, which I believe is by the Sufi’s which goes like this:

From you I receive, to you I give;
Together we share, and from this we live.

Which I think is a wonderful quote, and something to certainly think about in order to analyse exactly how you do live your life. As this has a direct impact on life, it is a real bonus if we can take this into computer science also… the first part (”From you I receive, to you I give”) we see in Open Data Initiatives, but in order to pick up on the second part (”Together we share, and from this we live”) we have to look towards Linked Data (which together with the Open Data Initiative results in the Linking Open Data Project).

There is a lot of stuff in computer science which could take advantage of theories and practices within philosophy, psychology and even religion. The key is to be open minded!

Hello everyone. Sorry if I’ve been a bit out of it today.

As many of you know, I’ve been having hardware problems. The good news is that I received my motherboard back this morning from the place where I bought it, where it had a nice BIOS update.

Today, I’ve been configuring it (hence why it may seem like I’ve been a bit “out of the picture” for the people who I deal with on a day to day basis). I apologise for this, and from this afternoon I should be back on track.

Note. I’m actually writing this blog post on my new machine

First plugin I installed in Firefox: OpenLink Data Explorer…. it has become one of those essential plugins for me.

Those viewing this post via an RSS reader may be interested to know that I have a new WordPress Theme. It is a modification of the XHTML Valid “Descartes Theme“. Come have a look at my blog now (”Daniel’s Blog“).

Feel free to let me know what you think of it. I obviously like it, one of the neat things is that it has a lot cleaner code than my previous Cutline-based theme.

Now for an incredibly Formal Blog Post. For equality I thought that I should open this up to as many people as possible, I’ve been pondering about making this blog post for a while, and I have even discussed the project with a few of you. Receiving my introduction pack and registration guide this morning has prompted me to write this post.

Intro

Many of you know that, I will be starting postgraduate study at the University of Bristol from the end of this September (2008). This will be a one-year full-time MSc course with project, the subject area is “Machine Learning and Data Mining“.

I would like to open up my project idea to an organisation in return for sponsorship of the course. I only ask for the cost of the tuition (£3950 GBP, which is currently roughly $7711 USD / €4982 Euros / $8032 Canadian Dollars / $8428 Australian Dollars / 323385 Indian Rupees / 830725 Japanese Yen / 52861 Chinese Yuan / 8102 Swiss Francs). In return the sponsor would have some say in the project itself, in addition to logos and names on all relevant websites and in documentation (negotiable).

I would (potentially) be interested in taking the project further after the project has been completed, this could be in the form of a business idea or another academic project. This is also negotiable.

My Project Proposal

I do already have an idea for a project, and have even written a project proposal which has been approved by the department. However, the content of that project proposal is negotiable and I could even change it completely depending on my interests/skills, the criteria for approval and also the sponsors interests.

The idea I already have will be an entirely new way of turning Free-Text into Linked Data, with the specific use-cases being very humanities (including anthropology and religion) based. But as said before, this is negotiable.

Course Information

The postgraduate course is officially titled “MSc in Advanced Computing (Machine Learning and Data Mining)”, it is a taught course but contains a full academic project. Topics within the course include Logic Programming (using Prolog), Bayesian methods, Natural Language Processing, Genetic Algorithms/programming, Neural Networks, Fuzzy Logic, Reinforcement Learning and some Bioinformatics content.

The official programming languages used at the University of Bristol include: C, Java, Haskell, Prolog, Progol… etc

Systems/Frameworks include: Weka, MatLab

A little about me

If you have just stumbled across this blog post, then you’ll be wondering about who I am. So a brief biographical summary:

I currently work as a Technology Evangelist for OpenLink Software dealing with Semantic Web/Linked Data technologies in addition to data portability, social web and database technologies. In May 2007 I completed my undergraduate degree with a 2:1 honours and a Double A grade for my final year project titled “Adding Semantics to Social Web Tagging Systems”, the undergraduate degree was a “BSc(Hons) in Intelligent Systems and Software Engineering” at Oxford Brookes University. My computer science interests are in the “Evolution of the Web” (so Semantic Web/Linked Data, the Social Web, Web 3.0, WUPnP and the Intelligent Web), Open Source Software and Open Data, Programming Languages and finally Intelligent Systems (mainly Logic Programming, Machine Learning, Data Mining, Agent Technology and Knowledge-Bases). I have experience in many programming/query languages, but some of my favourites include: Ruby, Java, Haskell, Prolog and SPARQL. My interests outside of computer science include: psychology, philosophy, music, religion and esoterica. I am a “Liberal Catholic Anglican” Christian and active/open-to/passionate-for Interfaith/Interreligious dialogue. I am a full member of the British Computer Society (BCS) and the Association of Computing Machinery (ACM). There is more about me on my simple homesite, my blog and my linkedin account, other information (including a CV) can be provided on request.

Important Dates

• Autumn Term: Monday 29th September 2008 to Friday 12th December 2008
• Spring Term: Friday 9th January 2009 to Friday 20th March 2009
• Summer Term: Monday 20th April 2009 to Friday 19th June 2009

I must have details about sponsorship as soon as possible, the final date for setting sponsorship up is Friday 12th September 2008…. and I really don’t want to leave it until then.

Useful (Official) Links

• Machine Learning and Data Mining Unit Descriptions
• University of Bristol and the University of Bristol’s Computer Science Department

If you are interested

If you are interested then please do let me know. I’m available by email or jabber… we can converse by phone or skype… and we can even meet up in/near the wonderful city of Bristol (UK).

• Email: danieljohnlewis [-at-] gmail [-dot-] com
• Jabber/GTalk: danieljohnlewis@gmail.com
• Skype: daniel.lewis
• Phone: +447834355516 (UK specific: 07834355516)
• Current Location: Clifton, Bristol, England, UK (it’s in the South-West, about a 2 hour train journey from London)
• Current Time Zone: British Summer Time (GMT+1)

I will announce

I will announce on my blog when I receive funding. So if you don’t hear, then please do assume that I have not found any yet.

Many many thanks for reading, and I hope to hear from interested people soon.

Cheers,

Daniel