The Semantic Web encourages institutions, including libraries, to collect, link and share their data across the Web in order to ease its processing by machines to get better queries and results. Linked Data technologies enable us to connect related data on the Web using the principles outlined by Tim Berners-Lee in 2006. Digital libraries have great potential to exchange and disseminate data linked to external resources using Linked Data. In this paper, a study about the current uses of Linked Data in digital libraries, including the most important implementations around the world, is presented. The study focuses on selected vocabularies and ontologies, benefits and problems encountered in implementing Linked Data in digital libraries. In addition, it also identifies and discusses specific challenges that digital libraries face, offering suggestions for ways in which libraries can contribute to the Semantic Web. The study uses an adapted methodology for literature review, to find data available to answer research questions. It is based on the information found in the library websites recommended by W3C Library Linked Data Incubator Group in 2011, and scientific publications from Google Scholar, Scopus, ACM and Springer from the last 5 years. The selected libraries for the study are the National Library of France, the Europeana Library, the Library of Congress of the USA, the British Library and the National Library of Spain. In this paper, we outline the best practices found in each experience and identify gaps and future trends.

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Current state of Linked Data in digital libraries

Research data curation initiatives must support heterogeneous kinds of projects, data, and metadata. This article examines variability in data and metadata practices using "institutions" as the key theoretical concept. Institutions, in the sense used here, are stable patterns of human behavior that structure, legitimize, or delegitimize actions, relationships, and understandings within particular situations. Based on prior conceptualizations of institutions, a theoretical framework is presented that outlines 5 categories of "institutional carriers" for data practices: a norms and symbols, b intermediaries, c routines, d standards, and e material objects. These institutional carriers are central to understanding how scientific data and metadata practices originate, stabilize, evolve, and transfer. This institutional framework is applied to 3 case studies: the Center for Embedded Networked Sensing CENS, the Long Term Ecological Research LTER network, and the University Corporation for Atmospheric Research UCAR. These cases are used to illustrate how institutional support for data and metadata management are not uniform within a single organization or academic discipline. Instead, broad spectra of institutional configurations for managing data and metadata exist within and across disciplines and organizations.

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Research data and metadata curation as institutional issues

Purpose




The purpose of this paper is to detail a low-cost, low-maintenance publishing strategy aimed at unlocking the value of Linked Data collections held by libraries, archives and museums (LAMs).




Design/methodology/approach




The shortcomings of commonly used Linked Data publishing approaches are identified, and the current lack of substantial collections of Linked Data exposed by LAMs is considered. To improve on the discussed status quo, a novel approach for publishing Linked Data is proposed and demonstrated by means of an archive of DBpedia versions, which is queried in combination with other Linked Data sources.




Findings




The authors show that the approach makes publishing Linked Data archives easy and affordable, and supports distributed querying without causing untenable load on the Linked Data sources.




Research limitations/implications




The proposed approach significantly lowers the barrier for publishing, maintaining, and making Linked Data collections queryable. As such, it offers the potential to substantially grow the distributed network of queryable Linked Data sources. Because the approach supports querying without causing unacceptable load on the sources, the queryable interfaces are expected to be more reliable, allowing them to become integral building blocks of robust applications that leverage distributed Linked Data sources.




Originality/value




The novel publishing strategy significantly lowers the technical and financial barriers that LAMs face when attempting to publish Linked Data collections. The proposed approach yields Linked Data sources that can reliably be queried, paving the way for applications that leverage distributed Linked Data sources through federated querying.

Toward sustainable publishing and querying of distributed Linked Data archives

Building upon a collection with functionality for discovery and analysis has been described by Lynch as a `layered' approach to digital libraries. Meanwhile, as digital corpora have grown in size, their analysis is necessarily supplemented by automated application of computational methods, which can create layers of information as intricate and complex as those within the content itself. This combination of layers - aggregating homogeneous collections, specialised analyses, and new observations - requires a flexible approach to systems implementation which enables pathways through the layers via common points of understanding, while simultaneously accommodating the emergence of previously unforeseen layers. In this paper we follow a Linked Data approach to build a layered digital library based on content from the Internet Archive Live Music Archive. Starting from the recorded audio and basic information in the Archive, we first deploy a layer of catalogue metadata which allows an initial - if imperfect - consolidation of performer, song, and venue information. A processing layer extracts audio features from the original recordings, workflow provenance, and summary feature metadata. A further analysis layer provides tools for the user to combine audio and feature data, discovered and reconciled using interlinked catalogue and feature metadata from layers below. Finally, we demonstrate the feasibility of the system through an investigation of `key typicality' across performances. This highlights the need to incorporate robustness to inevitable `imperfections' when undertaking scholarship within the digital library, be that from mislabelling, poor quality audio, or intrinsic limitations of computational methods. We do so not with the assumption that a `perfect' version can be reached; but that a key benefit of a layered approach is to allow accurate representations of information to be discovered, combined, and investigated for informed interpretation.

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Realising a layered digital library: exploration and analysis of the live music archive through linked data

The aim of this study was to explore the benefits and challenges to using Linked Data (LD) in Libraries, Archives and Museums (LAMs) as perceived by Information Professionals (IPs). The study also aimed to gain an insight into potential solutions for overcoming these challenges. Data was collected via a questionnaire which was completed by 185 Information Professionals (IPs) from a range of LAM institutions. Results indicated that IPs find the process of integrating and interlinking LD datasets particularly challenging, and that current LD tooling does not meet their needs. The study showed that LD tools designed with the workflows and expertise of IPs in mind could help overcome these challenges.

Understanding the Position of Information Professionals with regards to Linked Data: A Survey of Libraries, Archives and Museums

This article provides a representative overview of literature related to the idea of replacing MARC with a linked-data metadata structure, covering the period from 2002 through the 2012 release of the draft of the proposed bibliographic framework, BIBFRAME. Works proposing the replacement of MARC or exploring linked data in a library context are examined. In particular, key documents leading to the creation of the Library of Congress Bibliographic Framework Transition Initiative are examined, along with some of the critical responses they received, to better understand the chain of ideas shaping BIBFRAME.

The Road to BIBFRAME: The Evolution of the Idea of Bibliographic Transition into a Post-MARC Future

In efforts to offer the best access possible to users, libraries are increasingly interested in systems that better respond to user needs. Discovery systems provide a single-search interface to all library resources through a single index of content. A number of black box issues plague discovery at present; these could be remedied through the application of standards. Issues are related to the content that is indexed, the metadata that is provided, and the algorithms used to provide a list of relevant results. The profession should consider the adoption of the Open Discovery Initiative as a first step in applying standards to this sector. The proprietary algorithms in use are necessary, but vendors and content providers at the same time have an obligation to follow standards as a way of best addressing the black box issues that have arisen.

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Angela Kroeger

Papers

The Road to BIBFRAME: The Evolution of the Idea of Bibliographic Transition into a Post-MARC Future

What's Driving Discovery Systems? The Case for Standards