Incorporating the Semantic Web into Java

[Martijn Verburg]

Hi Tim,

Thanks for posting here and it looks like interesting work! I suspect you
won't get many in depth replies here as the Java 9 code complete date is
flying in pretty quick, so I'll jump in.

My personal view is that the semantic web is not enough of a mainstream
Java developer concern that it would be desirable to be part of OpenJDK /
Java itself at this stage even for Java 9 or 10. Java is arguably
conservative in its approach to additions and tends to add support for
industry trends once they are well baked.

A good starting point would be to further  popularise your efforts as an
OSS project and have it become a defacto std used by 1000's+ developers
before going down the formal JDK Enhancement Proposal (JEP) process
sometime in the future.

Cheers,
Martijn

On Wednesday, 26 August 2015, Timothy Armstrong <t.armstrong888 at gmail.com>
wrote:

> Greetings,
>
> I want to propose that we incorporate the Semantic Web technologies as a
> core part of Java.  The Semantic Web and object-oriented programming are
> very compatible and can work very well together.  I have always believed
> there is a lot of value in the Semantic Web, and I believe that it would be
> very beneficial for Java to incorporate the Semantic Web in the manner I
> have in mind.
>
> This is my first post here.  I thought this mailing list might be the best
> place to post.  I recently signed the Oracle Contributor Agreement.
>
> People have always noted connections between object-oriented programming
> and the Semantic Web, such as in the introduction to the Semantic Web at
> [1], which you could read if you are not familiar with the Semantic Web.  I
> believe that we should integrate the two technologies more closely.
>
> I have written a large piece of software towards using the Semantic Web in
> Java [2].  I would be very pleased to contribute any of this code to
> OpenJDK, if you think it would be worthwhile.  The software allows us to
> give IRI's and semantics to Java classes and attributes using Java
> annotations.  For example, here is the isDefinedBy.java file for the
> isDefinedBy property in the RDFS ontology:
>
>
> @RDFProperty
> @label("isDefinedBy")
> @comment("The definition of the subject resource.")
> @isDefinedBy("http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#")
> @domain(Resource.class)
> @range(Resource.class)
> @subPropertyOf(seeAlso.class)
>
> @Documented
> @Retention(RetentionPolicy.RUNTIME)
> public @interface isDefinedBy
> {
>     public String[] value();
> }
>
>
> We can treat Java classes as unary predicates, as in the Semantic Web, and
> Java attributes as binary predicates relating two entities, as RDF
> properties.  Then we can use the OWL reasoning in Java programs in a manner
> that is fully compatible with Java, and we can make Java data into linked
> data so that we can run SPARQL queries on the data and post the data on the
> Semantic Web.
>
> My software is a Java library intended to be useful in writing Java
> programs in general.  I published an article about the ideas in 2014 [3],
> and I explain more what I am thinking on the front page of the software's
> web site.
>
> The Semantic Web is a mature set of technologies.  Mostly what we would
> need to do is connect existing reasoning and SPARQL algorithms to Java.  I
> have written the framework for doing so.
>
> I hope you find these ideas interesting.  I would very much like to work
> together with other people on developing software towards these goals.
> Functional programming was a great addition to Java 8, and I think the
> Semantic Web would be a great addition to Java 9 or 10.
>
> Regards,
> Tim Armstrong
>
>
> [1] http://www.w3.org/TR/sw-oosd-primer/
> [2] http://semanticoop.sourceforge.net
> [3] http://dl.acm.org/citation.cfm?id=2630608
>


-- 
Cheers, Martijn (Sent from Gmail Mobile)