Module X01c: The Semantic Web
                           -----------------------------

OBJECTIVES

A. Restate the vision of the "Semantic Web" as articulated by Tim
	Berners-Lee and his colleagues;

B. Differentiate between the current World Wide Web and the Semantic Web;

C. Illustrate the type of activity which the Semantic Web may make possible;

D. List differences between the current Web and the envisioned Semantic Web;

E. List specific changes that need to be made in Web page design to make the 
	envisioned Web possible.


QUESTIONS
Answers are listed at the end of this document

1. Briefly explain what the "Sementic Web" is intended to make possible.






2. What are the main differences between the World Wide Web as it
	was during its first 10 years, and the Semantic Web as
	envisioned?







3. Give a brief example of the sort of thing a software agent
	would be able to do on the Semantic Web, that is not possible on
	the World Wide Web.









4. What steps are necessary for Web page coders to enable their
	documents to be part of the Semantic Web?








5. What new systems will need to be in place before the Semantic
	Web can become a usable reality?









6. What tool is proposed for developing and extending languages
	that computers can understand?





7. What framework is proposed for defining relationships between
	ideas and resources?






8. What is being proposed as a way of letting people define new
	ideas and resources so that computers can access the definitions
	from anywhere on the Web?




















ANSWERS

1. The Semantic Web is intended to make the entire World Wide Web
	searchable by software agents in sophisticated, meaning-based
	ways.	[X01cA1s]

2. The World Wide Web provides no way for software agents to dig
	out the meanings behind the words used, or the goods and services
	offered.	[X01cB1s]

3. Any example like those below, in which complex information and
	service tasks are completed primarily by software agents: -
	Making appointments for a series of physical therapy sessions
	with an approved physical therapist, within a given distance, at
	a convenient time (this is the example given in Tim Berners-Lee's
	Scientific American article). - Finding examples of plans with
	cost estimates for renovating an urban "brownfield" apartment
	building to include apartments over shops and recreational space.
	- Assembling a list of all the components of a given quality
		level necessary to build a computer for the lowest possible
		price. 
	- Assembling a list of references in juried academic
		publications before 1987, describing research on epidemics among
		peoples of the Artic.	[X01cC1s]

4. Use XHTML, rather than HTML; don't use deprecated tags like
	<font>, <b>, and <i>; Indicate the structure of the document with
	headings, using the heading tags <h1> - <h6>; Control the
	appearance of the document by using CSS.	[X01cE1s]

5. A tool for developing and extending languages that computers
	can understand; A framework for defining relationships between
	ideas and resources; A way of letting people define new ideas and
	resources so that computers can access the definitions from
	anywhere on the Web.	[X01cD1s]

6. XML, the eXtensible Markup Language 	[X01cD2s]

7. RDF, the Resource Definition Framework 	[X01cD3s]

8. RDF-XML, an XML-based notation for defining resources, made
	available on the Internet by giving each resource a URI, Uniform
	Resource Identifier.	[X01cD4s]