INTERNATIONAL CONFERENCENCE FOR DIGITAL LIBRARIES AND THE SEMANTIC WEB 2009 (ICSD 2009)

The International Conferences on Digital Libraries and the Semantic Web 2009 (ICSD2009) will take place from September 8-11 at the University of Trento.
The first ICSD was organized  in 2007 by the Indian Institute of Statistics in Bangalore. The great interest in the conference showed the need to create a communication area between the two communities. The goal is to facilitate the creation digital library application which could be brickstones of the semantic web.

Wolfgang Nejdl (University of Hannover)
Johannes Keizer (FAO of the United Nations)
Paolo Bouquet (University of Trento)
Heiko Stoermer (University of Trento) - Chair of the Local Organization Committee, contact: stoermer@disi.unitn.it
Devika Madalli (Indian Institute of Statistics, Bangalore)
ARD Prasad (Indian Institute of Statistics, Bangalore)
Dagobert Soergel (University of Maryland)

Digital libraries, in the central view of the term, focus on storing and organizing digital objects and providing access to these objects through professional or user-generated metadata or content-based search (full text, image content, full musical score).  In an expanded view, DLs also support annotation, generation or editing of digital objects and provide tools for processing digital objects.  The semantic Web focuses on the formal representation of data for more precise retrieval and, more importantly, for reasoning so that many often disparate items of data can be combined to directly answer a user’s question or to devise a plan of action.  ICDLSW addresses tow main questions:

   (1)    How can digital libraries support Semantic Web functionality?

   (2)    How can Semantic Web technology improve digital libraries?

Ultimately the goal is an environment in which all functionality is available to the user without the perception of different systems or system boundaries.

Contributions are sought that address one or both of the main questions or steps towards the ultimate
system.  Some example topics are listed below, but the purpose of this list is just to stimulate thinking. 

Specific topics that address one or both of the main questions

• Digital objects that provide formal representation of data ready for reasoning, possibly in addition to text, images, or sound.
• Knowledge acquisition: Editing tools that assist subject experts in the creation of formal representations of data.
• Digital objects that interact with the user or software agents.
• Standards and specifications for digital objects
• Organization and retrieval of software agents and Semantic Web services.
• Semantic search.  Use of ontologies and knowledge bases (such as topic maps) to improve search for digital objects.
• Question answering from text, from data/knowledge bases, or a combination.
• Next generation OPACs
• The structure and creation of ontologies to support these functions.
• Using the intellectual capital available in traditional KOS such as Dewey Decimal Classification (DDC), UDC, or MeSH in the construction of ontologies that support truly semantic search and reasoning.
• Vocabulary and taxonomy development
• Multilingual issues in Digital Libraries.
• Semantics of bibliographical databases
• Metadata standards, Interoperability and Crosswalks
• Digital Library and Semantic Web Projects and Case Studies