CONPES 109 de 2007 – Política de primera Infancia

The SRS commences with a statement of purpose. The scope and an overall description of the system are then outlined. Functional requirements are also specified, including an event list and data flow diagrams, which show how actors are likely to interact with the system and what the associated data flows would be. Interface requirements are specified, including hardware and software interfaces, as well as the system’s Semantic Web components. Finally, the screen designs are presented, followed by a usability guide that describes typical system processing from an end-user perspective.

4.2.1.1 Statement of Purpose

The purpose of AcontoWeb is to create a system that provides a tangible benefit over existing accommodation Web portals by allowing tourism customers to search the underlying concepts of a Website, thus producing results that more closely match the customer’s needs. This is achieved by using Semantic Web technology to infer knowledge about resorts and seamlessly integrating that knowledge so that it can be used by a tourism customer when searching for suitable accommodation.

4.2.1.2 Scope of the System

The scope of the system is limited to the annotation and querying of Australian accommodation Websites. Only Websites annotated consistent with the accommodation ontology employed are included in the system. Cross-portal integration, as discussed in sub-section 2.2.8, is not supported. Such techniques are recognized as important for the integration of accommodation information, but fall outside the scope of what the system aims to demonstrate. Webpage annotations are conceptually consistent instance data of the accommodation ontology, and are queried by the GUI using a database lookup from a Jena91 _{backend knowledge base. Although conceptually consistent with the ontology, the}

instance data was manually captured from Web pages and inserted into the Jena knowledge base. The process of automatically capturing annotations from the Web had not been completed at the time of writing. The annotation tool, however, does contain an RDF extractor. This demonstrates that Webpage annotations are readily extractable from within Web pages, and is therefore sufficient to demonstrate proof of concept.

4.2.1.3 Overall Description

The AcontoWeb architecture (see Figure 40) is designed to support convenient annotation and intelligent querying of Semantic Web resources. Annotation software is used by a Web site owner to generate RDF markup describing the content of their Web site. The RDF markup is essentially instance data that conforms to an OWL accommodation ontology, and is imbedded by an annotation tool into readily extractable comment tags contained in a HTML file. Query functions are facilitated by a Jena based

SPARQL query engine that uses a Pellet92 _{reasoner and the OWL ontology to infer}

knowledge about the accommodation domain. The query facility is accessed remotely via a Web-based GUI and provides the end-user with a number of search options. Once a query is submitted, a list of matching results is displayed to the end-user. The annotation tool contains an FTP client to allow a Website owner (or, perhaps more likely, a contracted IT professional) to download their Website, annotate it then, upload it back to the host server. The annotation tool also contains an RDF extractor to allow the Website owner to readily extract and view RDF metadata imbedded in a Webpage.

To allow for a precise and measured comparison of queries between a conventional portal and a semantic portal, the data structure of the RACV accommodation93 _{(AAA tourism)}

portal was captured and remodelled using the relational modelling theory of Codd (1970). The data was then physically replicated in an Access database, as well as an OWL ontology (see Appendices D and E) by following the Methontology framework (see Appendix A). Two extra fields that were not part of RACV portal were added to both the database and the ontology. ‘Destination Attractions’ were added to demonstrate that with the use of transitive properties, attractions can automatically be inferred to be associated with a particular resort based on the resort’s location. ‘Destination

92 _{http://www.mindswap.org/2003/pellet/}

93 _{http://www.accommodationguide.com.au/searchgateway.asp?sit=2&aid=1}

Figure 40: AcontoWeb architecture.

End User Web Site Owner Annotation Tool Website A RDF HTML Website B RDF HTML Semantic Middleware Semantic Portal Accommoda- tion ontology (OWL)

Classification’ was added to demonstrate that by using OWL class restrictions, a location could automatically be inferred as a particular type of location based on the attractions and types of accommodation that are in the vicinity.

The criteria used to specify location types was based upon Tourism Victoria’s94 ₂₀₀₄

marketing segment classifications and was obtained from Tourism Research Australia95

and Roy Morgan Research96_{, and is provided in Appendix B. Locations were classified}

according to five major market segment types. Research indicates for example, that the Backpacker market segment includes tourists that prefer the attractions of nightclubs, pubs, aquariums, zoos, wildlife-parks, national parks and state forests, museums, art galleries, and like to stay at backpacker hostels. These location features were modelled into the accommodation ontology using class restrictions, so that resorts in locations containing these features were automatically assigned a Backpacker destination classification in the inferred ontology. Market segments included in the accommodation domain were:

• Adventure tourism. • Backpacker tourism.

• Caravan and camping tourism. • Cultural tourism.

• Food and wine tourism.

94 _{http://www.tourismvictoria.com.au/index.php}

95 _{Source: National and International Visitor Surveys, year ending December} 2004, Tourism Research Australia

96 _{Holiday Tracking Survey, year ending December 2004, Roy Morgan Research}

4.2.1.4 Product Perspective

The AcontoWeb portal contains information about holiday units, flats, houseboats, cottages, hotels, motels, guest houses, chalets, apartments, and self-catering accommodation, each listing all the facilities and local attractions available at resorts. All accommodation has previously been investigated by RACV field-workers and has been given an official star rating (up to 5 stars for the most elaborate and luxurious stays). Many of the businesses use their star-rating for promotional purposes.

4.2.1.5 Development Team

Coding of the AcontoWeb annotation tool was done by the researcher. To improve usability, the software was designed considering the requirements of Web site owners as established by the survey of tourism operators. Coding for the query component of the semantic portal required specialized Java programming skills. Funding was therefore sought (and subsequently obtained) from the School of Information Systems at Victoria University to outsource this part of the development to a specialist Java programmer. The project became part of a university funded collaborative research scheme, with the aim of refining AcontoWeb to a commercial standard. Designs for AcontoWeb were validated with publication of Abrahams & Dai (2005a) and Dai & Abrahams (2005) in the proceedings of the 2005 International Joint Conference on Web Intelligence and Intelligent Agent Technology held at Compiegne University France.