***Apologies for Cross-posting ***

=========== REGISTRATION CLOSES 5TH JUNE 2009 ==============

"Content Architecture: Exploiting and Managing Diverse Resources"
ISKO UK 2009 Conference, London, 22-23 June 2009

VENUE:    University College London, Gower Street, London, WC1E 6BT

FEE: 165 GBP (ISKO members and students: 135 GBP)

Registration closes on 5th June. Register on the conference site at
<http://www.iskouk.org/conf2009/index.htm>.

To avoid delays, excessive and uncertain bank charges and exchange rate
problems, payment by PayPal using a debit or credit card is strongly
recommended
for delegates from outside the UK. Those within the UK can also pay by bank
transfer or by sending a cheque (if you trust first class post to deliver it
in
time!)

The complete programme is available at
<http://www.iskouk.org/conf2009/programme.htm>.

We have 28 presentations, with speakers from ten countries. Topics include
semantic interoperability, image retrieval, multimedia challenges, mapping
and
modelling.

As keynote speakers we have:
- Professor David Crystal, the renowned author, linguist and broadcaster,
talking about semantic targeting;
- Clifford Lynch, Director of the Coalition for Networked Information, on
the
subject of e-Research and New Challenges in Knowledge Structuring


"Content Architecture: Exploiting and Managing Diverse Resources", is the
first
biennial conference of the UK Chapter of ISKO (International Society for
Knowledge Organization).

==========================================================

Hi,

One thing I am finding in my exploration into the use of taxonomy mgt tools with
sharepoint is that they aren't that widely used by Australian companies. N.B.
Australia is a comparatively small market at 20 million people.

From what I can tell, SchemaLogic have one client out here. Synaptica have a
handful (but none using the SP connector). SmartLogic, ConceptSearching &
Wordmap do not have any.

Metavis claim to have lots of Australian users (but as they have only recently
come out of beta, they only have one paying client globally).

This means that most Australian organisations are:
- not interested in metadata management in SP;
- using tools at the cheaper end of town (SharepartXXL, Kwizcom);
- building their own.

How does this compare with what people see in other countries?

Cheers,

Matt

Janice,
I am interested in attending the dinner.
Is there also going to be another planning meeting for the Taxonomy
Division?
Thanks,
Jan


Jan Herd
Business Reference Librarian
Science, Technology & Business Division
The Library of Congress
Washington, D.C. 20540
Tel. 202 707-1216
Fax 202 707-1925
English author Ashleigh Brilliant said, "The closest you will ever come
in this life to an orderly universe is a good library."
  "In the nonstop tsunami of global information, librarians provide us
with floaties and teach us how to swim."
  from a Washington Post article, 13 January 2001, p. C01




>>> Janice Keeler <keelerjs@...> 6/1/09 11:54:29 PM >>>
Reminder - workshop and dinner for taxonomists in Washington, DC on
June 13.

If you're interested in the workshop, register through SLA. See details
below.

If you're interested in dinner in DC with others who work in taxonomy
and related fields, please let me know and we'll send you the details.
The venue will be moderately priced, but chosen partly based on the size
of the anticipated group.

Regards,
Janice



--- On Fri, 5/1/09, Janice Keeler <keelerjs@...> wrote:

From: Janice Keeler <keelerjs@...>
Subject: Taxonomy workshop and separate dinner in Washington, DC on
June 13
To: "list TaxoCop" <taxocop@yahoogroups.com>
Date: Friday, May 1, 2009, 11:51 AM

As part of the SLA Annual Conference in Washington, DC, there is an
all-day workshop on taxonomy, meta-data and search on Saturday, June 13
(described below).  You can register for the workshop without attending
the conference. There are some other sessions that you may find relevant
as well. For information and registration see
http://www.sla.org/content/Events/conference/ac2009/index.cfm.


Also, anybody in the area interested in joining a group of people
working in taxonomy and related topics for dinner on Saturday evening,
June 13 is welcome. Just let me know if you are interested and we'll
sort out details depending on how many respond.









Click University -- Taxonomy Tidbits, Meta-data Madness--Insider
Information from the Experts



Saturday, 13 June 2009 8:00AM - 5:00PM
Ticketed Event #275
Price: US $349 member / US $500 non-member / US $175 student member
Location: TBA





Search*doesn*t work. A bold statement! Come learn why * share your
experiences. How does taxonomy save search? What is the relationship
between taxonomy and meta-data? How do you build and deploy them to save
search? Taxonomy is now a *must have*, no longer a nice to have.
Meta-data and particularly taxonomies (and variation, therein) have been
openly embraced by nonbelievers and covertly co-opted by the naysayers.
Learn why and how you can make the business case for your organization.
Come armed with questions and real life challenges to stump the experts!
Intermediate to advanced * fundamentals to more advanced topics are
covered; attendees should have had exposure to the topic and be prepared
to contribute real world challenges.

Audiences: All attendees

Speaker(s):

Marjorie Hlava, President and Chairman, Access Innovation Inc.

Alice Redmond-Neal, Access Innovation

Jay V Ven Eman, Access Innovation

[Apologies for any duplication.]

Greetings,

We're giving Taxonomy CoP List members a special discount to our new
UIE Roadshow: Secrets Behind Designing Great User Experiences, a
full-day workshop, based on 10 years of UIE's extensive research, that
will deliver new insights and inspire your team to create the best
user experiences.

This June, we're taking this workshop on the road, to Seattle,
Denver, and DC. There, I'll share information with you that
previously was only available to our biggest clients.

You'll learn these secrets:

-  What you can learn from the design processes behind Apple,
     Nintendo, and Netflix
-  How to take your team and designs to the next level
-  How constructing a solid experience vision is one of the most
     critical methods for getting your organization behind your
     UX efforts
-  What professional magicians know about using the art of illusion
     to simplify otherwise complex designs

An eventful day, with a ton of detailed examples, hands-on
exercises, my usual funny material, and, for the first time, live
magic tricks! See the details of the full-day program at
http://cli.gs/hMz45j

We have limited seating in every city. We're coming to:

- Seattle, WA on Tuesday, June 23, 2009
- Denver, CO on Thursday, June 25, 2009
- Washington, DC on Tuesday, June 30, 2009

We know the current economy is making things challenging. We also
know what you'll learn in this workshop will make your design a
critical part of your organization's strategy. Therefore, we've
priced this seminar to make it easy to sign up.

As a Taxonomy CoP list member, you can use the TAXCOP promotion code,
which qualifies you for the lowest individual price of $349 ($125
off). Or you can bring your team and get group rates as low as $299
for each person (no promotion code needed). You won't find this
quality of information for a price that good anywhere else.

You can't afford to miss this Roadshow. Find out everything you need
to know at http://www.uie.com/events/roadshow/

I hope to see you there,

Jared M. Spool

p.s. Register by 6/5 with TAXCOP to get the lowest individual rate of
$349 and even lower group rates: http://www.uie.com/events/roadshow/

Another side note on #semtech2009: there will be an international Meetup @
Meetup of Meetups (Semantic Web Meetup Groups get together) Monday evening, June
15th at the conference (does not require conference fee to attend)
http://www.semantic-conference.com/session/1890/

See you there!

Jillian

--- In TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com, Tony Shaw <anthonypetershaw@...> wrote:
>
> Hi Christine, Seth, and all,
>
> The SemTech Conference hashtag this year is actually #semtech2009
>
> Anyone from this list who would like to attend in person can get $300 off the
full conference fees by using the coupon code of TAXO. Or else you may also
attend the exhibits only program for free.  The conference web site for the
agenda and registration is here:
> http://SemTech2009.com
>
> Tony Shaw
> www.SemanticUniverse.com
>
>
>
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: Christine Connors <CJMConnors@...>
> To: TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com
> Sent: Monday, May 25, 2009 12:15:31 PM
> Subject: Re: [TaxoCoP] ... (and note on twitter)
>
>
>
>
>
> Hey Seth and friends -
>
> "Tweets" can contain #hashtags - that's what those social tags are called. You
preface a term with a # indicating subject. You can at the tag at the end of the
tweet, orincorporate the term into your mesage (kind of like inline tagging.)
They are very useful for finding things, but when a particular hashtag gets
popular and spreads virally, they become fodder for spammers. That said, you can
generally make it through a conference or event using the event's hashtag, and
keep up with what everyone else is saying. It's VERY useful! Try it out at your
next event; for example, I suspect the hashtag for the Semantic Technology
Conference this year will be #semtech09 (if last year is any indication). Smart
conference orgaizers will tell you what the hashtag is, so watch for a note from
Tony and/or Eric about the 'official' tag.
>
> You can find me on Twitter as CJMConnors if you're interested - looking
forward to your first status update Seth!
>
> Cheers,
> Christine
>
>
>
>
> ________________________________
> From: Seth Earley <seth@earley. com>
> To: "TaxoCoP@yahoogroup s.com" <TaxoCoP@yahoogroups .com>
> Sent: Wednesday, May 20, 2009 10:20:42 AM
> Subject: RE: [TaxoCoP] enterprise taxonomy presentations? (and note on
twitter)
>
>
> Thanks Patrick…  I was just  thinking of that
> today after watching one of Joe Bachana’s videos on open source versus
> proprietary content management systems which was nicely done http://tinyurl.
com/p9dctw  …  Need to investigate.  J
>
> By the way, I picked that up on Twitter �"if anyone is
> using Twitter for interesting things send me a tweet (not used to saying that
> yet �" sounds so weird <smile>)
>
> @sethearley
>
> Completely new to this �" but some colleagues have said it
> is useful if tweets are tagged and categorized (there’s the taxonomy
connection!)
> and if they have useful professional information.  So that would be what I
> am looking for.
>
> You can also send me a note at seth@earley. com off line  if you would like.
>
> Seth
>
> From:TaxoCoP@yahoogroups .com
> [mailto:TaxoCoP@ yahoogroups. com] On Behalf Of Patrick Lambe
> Sent: Wednesday, May 20, 2009 6:25 AM
> To: TaxoCoP@yahoogroups .com
> Subject: Re: [TaxoCoP] enterprise taxonomy presentations?
>
>
> Nick
>
> I have collected some videos of speakers on taxonomy at http://plambe. blip.tv
including a couple based
> on my book, but mine are not as specific as your need. There are some very
nice
> practice-focused ones from Christine Connors, Marti Heymann, Joseph Busch
among
> others. http://plambe. blip.tv/search? q=taxonomy+ plambe
>
> Daniela Barbosa blogged some taxonomy video links to a
> debate between Seth and Theresa Regli on core taxonomy issues a while back,
not
> sure if all the links are still working, however. http://danielabarbo
sa.blogspot. com/2008/ 03/staged- debates-on- taxonomies. html
>
> Seth, you should do more video podcasting, I have an
> instinct you would be brilliant at it!
>
> P
>
>
> Patrick Lambe
>
> weblog: www.greenchameleon. com
> website: www.straitsknowledg e.com
> book: www.organisingknowl edge.com
>
> Have you seen our KM Method Cards?   http://www.straitsk nowledge. com/store/
>
>
>
> On May 19, 2009, at 11:27 PM, Nick Berry wrote:
>
>
>
> Hi, I'm looking for a good video to show business folks on how a
> taxonomy can be used inside the enterprise for business metrics, data
> management, etc.  Sometimes it helps to have the information come from a
> source other than yourself, just to prove that other people are talking about
> it.  ;)
>
> Any good suggestions?  Maybe
> someone's conference presentation?  A particularly successful COP call?
>  All ideas appreciated.
>
> Thanks,
> Nick
>

Taxonomies & Controlled Vocabularies online workshop - September & November

"Taxonomies and Controlled Vocabularies"
      September 1 - October 5 (5 weeks)
      November 1 - December 5 (5 weeks)
Cost: $250 (Simmons GSLIS Alum $200)
Workshop summary:
http://www.simmons.edu/gslis/careers/continuing-education/workshops/online.php#t\
axonomies
Outline and readings (pdf):
http://gslisce.simmons.edu/downloads/09SP/Taxonomies_and_Controlled_Vocabularies\
.pdf
Preview page: http://www.hedden-information.com/GSLIS-taxonomies.htm

Sessions fill up early. The July session was filled by mid-May, and the
May workshop was filled by mid-March. Space is limited to allow for
individualized feedback.

Updates to the online workshop:

1) Online registration/credit card payments are now accepted, making it
easier especially for international registration.

2) All five lessons are now posted and available for the start of the
course, so you can get ahead if you are not available for a week or two
during the course session.

3) The course has been enhanced with expanded taxonomy/thesaurus
software information and access, including student login access to a
web-based system,Synaptica, and multi-platform Data Harmony Thesaurus
Master, and information on a Macintosh program (Cognatrix).

-- Heather

--
Heather Hedden
Hedden Information Management
98 East Riding Drive
Carlisle, MA 01741-1602
Tel. 978-371-0822
Heather@...
http://www.Hedden-Information.com

Mike Gardner
EDS Test Manager & Information Architect

EDS - an HP Company
Derby, UK
Office: +44 (0)1332 522431
Mobile: +44 (0)7790 492991
Home Office: +44 (0)1332 663964 (rarely used)
micheal.gardner@...

---

From: TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com [mailto:TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Nick Berry
Sent: 11 June 2009 18:04
To: TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com
Subject: [TaxoCoP] taxonomies & master data management

Hi there, does anyone use their taxonomy tool as a system of record to store reference data (like Customer, Product, Location, and definitions/relationships/attributes/properties/aggregates thereof)?  

How do you manage ownership, workflow, governance, change management, lifecycle management, data quality, and data lineages?  Do you use data stewards for domains?  

I'm trying to make the case to use our taxonomy tool for this purpose (hey, I'm a neutral party), but I've never seen it done before so I'm hoping to hook up with someone who has experience with this and wouldn't mind some occasional banter with me about it.

Cheers,

Nick

Nick Berry

Content Architect & Taxonomist

REI (Recreational Equipment, Inc.)

http://www.rei.com/

There is (I think) a general assumption that all terms in a thesaurus
should be neatly grouped under, say, 20 top terms. In practice, it is
often difficult to allocate a broader term to every term in a thesaurus
without some distortion.

Is there any reason why every term has to have a broader term? Is there
anything wrong with many top terms? I am looking for general principles
that would apply across a range of projects.

I notice that the World Bank thesaurus
(http://www.multites.net/mtsql/wb/site/) lets you search for orphan
terms, of which they have many. I also noticed that the Australian
Government TAGS thesaurus has a number of orphan terms. It is possible
that the assumption that we need neat hierarchies is not as widespread
as thought.

Thanks,

Glenda.

--
Glenda Browne
Indexer, Writer, Teacher
www.webindexing.biz

Hi Glenda,

Well, that's one of the main differences between a taxonomy and a
thesaurus. A taxonomy is structured in hierarchies, not permitting
orphan terms. A thesaurus, on the other hand, focuses on the term, not
the structure, and while each term may have a number of hierarchical
relationships, orphan terms may be permitted. Now you could also have a
thesaurus that prohibits orphan terms and rather contains any number of
small hierarchies (in a sense orphan hierarchies of just two levels
perhaps).  The is a design policy decision that needs to be made at the
outset.

If users enter primarily by browsing or drilling down through a
hierarchical display, then you want a hierarchical taxonomy with no
orphan terms, and the number of hierarchies should be limited.
If users enter primarily by searching on terms or by browsing an
alphabetical list of terms, then you want a thesaurus (or at least a
controlled vocabulary), and you don't need to worry about structuring
complete hierarchies (merely ensuring that a term's immediate
relationships are correct), and orphan terms can be tolerated.

-- Heather

Heather Hedden
Hedden Information Management
Heather@...
www.Hedden-Information.com



Webindexing wrote:
> There is (I think) a general assumption that all terms in a thesaurus
> should be neatly grouped under, say, 20 top terms. In practice, it is
> often difficult to allocate a broader term to every term in a thesaurus
> without some distortion.
>
> Is there any reason why every term has to have a broader term? Is there
> anything wrong with many top terms? I am looking for general principles
> that would apply across a range of projects.
>
> I notice that the World Bank thesaurus
> (http://www.multites.net/mtsql/wb/site/) lets you search for orphan
> terms, of which they have many. I also noticed that the Australian
> Government TAGS thesaurus has a number of orphan terms. It is possible
> that the assumption that we need neat hierarchies is not as widespread
> as thought.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Glenda.
>
>

At 6:41 PM -0400 6/15/09, Heather Hedden wrote:
>Hi Glenda,
>
>Well, that's one of the main differences between a taxonomy and a
>thesaurus. A taxonomy is structured in hierarchies, not permitting
>orphan terms. A thesaurus, on the other hand, focuses on the term, not
>the structure, and while each term may have a number of hierarchical
>relationships, orphan terms may be permitted.

That reminds me of an old version of the Autonomy auto-categorizer,
which was so obsessed with the right number of nodes and branches
that they'd move things around to keep them balanced.  Pretty hard on
the humans, because their learned navigation paths disappeared.
Sometimes the best is the enemy of the good.

Avi


--
Search Analysis and Help -- Search Tools Consulting
     (510) 845-2551  / analyst@...
Complete Guide to Search Engines for Web Sites and Intranets:
<http://searchtools.com>

Glenda,

I’m a taxonomy consultant who started off in the field by working on the
Modern Language Association’s International Bibliography Thesaurus.

I agree with Heather’s assessment, and I would add the following
considerations and expansions based on my experience as a thesaurus editor:

1. How is the thesaurus displayed? We used Lotus Notes and the 56K+ terms were
displayed in an alphabetized list. It was possible to discover orphan terms,
and, believe me, there were many. From the users’ perspective, each term was
essentially “equal” in the list. Getting to the right term was easy if you
knew it, but the structure itself may lead users to the exact term they wish to
use if they are browsing rather than searching.

2. Can users discover an orphaned term? Terms used for indexing were as obvious
or obscure as the article being indexed, the indexers subject area knowledge,
and the indexers familiarity with the thesaurus. If, for example, the article
dealt with race in William Faulkner, the terms “race” and “Faulkner,
William” were easy enough to locate in a list. However, if the article were
about race and marriage, are the terms “race” and “marriage,”
“interracial marriage,” or is it really “miscegenation”? I can’t speak
for everyone, but miscegenation was not in my vocabulary prior to the MLA, and I
would have never found it if it had not been for ensuring terms had at least a
broader or related term for discoverability.

3. How is the thesaurus maintained? I know if I had unlimited time, resources,
and authority, I would have audited the MLA Thesaurus and begun hacking and
retiring terms that were of little or no value. These include terms that were
outdated, infrequently used, or were really covered by a more useful entry.
While I know from experience that adding and deleting terms was carefully
controlled, the age of the thesaurus and the volume of articles indexed made it
inevitable that there would be hundreds, if not thousands, of terms which were
no longer useful. My bet is that many of these unused terms are actually orphan
terms which had no path of discoverability.

Overall, I don’t see any problem with orphan terms, unless, as Heather pointed
out, it is a hierarchical display used for browsing. I’m sure you can imagine
what the top level will eventually look like if any term is allowed to be
orphaned. The nice thing about a thesaurus is that you can have valuable terms
with no parent, child, or related term without forcing structures that don’t
make sense.

The caution with orphan terms is, of course, to not let them get out of control.
If orphan terms are undiscoverable because they are not linked, you will find
yourself with synonyms, variants, and unused terms cluttering your thesaurus.
The policy at the MLA was link a new term to something whenever possible.
Research what’s already in the thesaurus and decide how this new term could be
made more discoverable.

Ahren
ahren.lehnert@...

--- In TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com, Avi Rappoport <analyst@...> wrote:
>
> At 6:41 PM -0400 6/15/09, Heather Hedden wrote:
> >Hi Glenda,
> >
> >Well, that's one of the main differences between a taxonomy and a
> >thesaurus. A taxonomy is structured in hierarchies, not permitting
> >orphan terms. A thesaurus, on the other hand, focuses on the term, not
> >the structure, and while each term may have a number of hierarchical
> >relationships, orphan terms may be permitted.
>
> That reminds me of an old version of the Autonomy auto-categorizer,
> which was so obsessed with the right number of nodes and branches
> that they'd move things around to keep them balanced.  Pretty hard on
> the humans, because their learned navigation paths disappeared.
> Sometimes the best is the enemy of the good.
>
> Avi
>
>
> --
> Search Analysis and Help -- Search Tools Consulting
>     (510) 845-2551  / analyst@...
> Complete Guide to Search Engines for Web Sites and Intranets:
> <http://searchtools.com>
>

Hi, Glenda,

I agree that it's often difficult to smash all terms into an arbitrary
recommended max number of top terms, be it 20 or 30 or whatever. However, it's
important to go back to the definition of taxonomy and thesaurus in the Z39.19
standard. For both, organization is integral.

A taxonomy is "a hierarchically organized vocabulary based on a classification
scheme". "A classification scheme is a method of organization, usually a
hierarchical structure of relationships among entities." A thesaurus is "a
controlled vocabulary arranged in a known order in which equivalence,
homographic, hierarchical, and associative relationships among terms are clearly
displayed and identified... Its purposes are...to facilitate browsing and
searching."

As Heather pointed out, if end user/searchers don't ever see the structure of
the vocabulary, it doesn't matter much beyond the fact that they don't get what
could be helpful information about broader or narrower concepts, which orphans
don't have. And as Ahren pointed out, orphan terms can easily multiply and get
out of control. A vocabulary with a few is one thing, but one where they start
multiplying loses sight of the original goal of organization to support
navigation, whether it be for an end user or the indexer.

I don't feel so strongly about a set number of top terms. However, orphan terms
suggests to me that it's time to reconsider the basic structure to find a happy
place for them. That might mean reconsidering the scope of some concepts or
tinkering with the wording of terms to make them more welcoming to the strays.

Alice

--- In TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com, Webindexing <webindexing@...> wrote:
>
> There is (I think) a general assumption that all terms in a thesaurus
> should be neatly grouped under, say, 20 top terms. In practice, it is
> often difficult to allocate a broader term to every term in a thesaurus
> without some distortion.
>
> Is there any reason why every term has to have a broader term? Is there
> anything wrong with many top terms? I am looking for general principles
> that would apply across a range of projects.
>
> I notice that the World Bank thesaurus
> (http://www.multites.net/mtsql/wb/site/) lets you search for orphan
> terms, of which they have many. I also noticed that the Australian
> Government TAGS thesaurus has a number of orphan terms. It is possible
> that the assumption that we need neat hierarchies is not as widespread
> as thought.
>
> Thanks,
>
> Glenda.
>
> --
> Glenda Browne
> Indexer, Writer, Teacher
> www.webindexing.biz
>

Hi, Nick,

I second Mike's recommendations about governance and ownership of thesaurus
terms. He describes an excellent process.

As for using a taxonomy tool to store the various types of data you outline, a
taxonomy tool designed to comply with Z39.19 standards should meet your
requirements. It must have a Scope Note field to capture your definition of a
term, i.e. your interpretation of it within your domain. Ability to capture
relationships is a given, a standard requirement within such a tool. Attributes
and properties should also be handle-able as additional term record fields. As
for customer, product, and location, these, too, should be easily captured in
fields that are customizable in a strong thesaurus software tool.

It's important to use a dedicated thesaurus/taxonomy software. I have often seen
taxonomy projects limited by the constraints of taxonomy modules offered as part
of a CMS. A CMS that doesn't support basic thesaurus features like related
terms, synonyms, and polyhierarchy just doesn't work. And custom fields are far
beyond such a limited tool/module. Stick with a dedicated thesaurus/taxonomy
software tool that offers all these functions. Then it's no problem to capture
all the bits of data you mention within the tool.

Alice

--- In TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com, Nick Berry <infoglutton@...> wrote:
>
> Hi there, does anyone use their taxonomy tool as a system of record to store
> reference data (like Customer, Product, Location, and
> definitions/relationships/attributes/properties/aggregates thereof)?
> How do you manage ownership, workflow, governance, change management,
> lifecycle management, data quality, and data lineages?  Do you use data
> stewards for domains?
>
> I'm trying to make the case to use our taxonomy tool for this purpose (hey,
> I'm a neutral party), but I've never seen it done before so I'm hoping to
> hook up with someone who has experience with this and wouldn't mind some
> occasional banter with me about it.
>
> Cheers,
> Nick
>
> Nick Berry
> Content Architect & Taxonomist
> REI (Recreational Equipment, Inc.)
> http://www.rei.com/
>

On Tue, 16 Jun 2009 at 08:24:02, Webindexing
<webindexing@...> wrote
>There is (I think) a general assumption that all terms in a thesaurus
>should be neatly grouped under, say, 20 top terms. In practice, it is
>often difficult to allocate a broader term to every term in a thesaurus
>without some distortion.
>
>Is there any reason why every term has to have a broader term? Is there
>anything wrong with many top terms? I am looking for general principles
>that would apply across a range of projects.
>
>Thanks,
>
>Glenda.

I think that it is often helpful to apply facet analysis to the concepts
being organised, so that we group concepts depending on the fundamental
categories to which they belong. Thus we can group them into facets such
as "objects", "materials", "living things", "people", "organizations",
"abstract concepts", "places" and so on. These facet names can become
top terms of hierarchies.

Each orphan term will belong to a facet such as these, and this is the
initial step in constructing hierarchies, because hierarchical
relationships can only apply to concepts in the same facet. (Part/whole
relationships may sometimes break this rule, but these should be used
only in certain specific and limited circumstances.)

This top-down approach has to be used in conjunction with the bottom-up
approach of examining concepts and considering what relationships they
should have, but it does avoid having a lot of orphans.

Leonard
--
Willpower Information     (Partners: Dr Leonard D Will, Sheena E Will)
Information Management Consultants            Tel: +44 (0)20 8372 0092
27 Calshot Way                              L.Will@...
ENFIELD                                Sheena.Will@...
EN2 7BQ, UK                            http://www.willpowerinfo.co.uk/

Mike Gardner
EDS Test Manager & Information Architect

EDS - an HP Company
Derby, UK
Office: +44 (0)1332 522431
Mobile: +44 (0)7790 492991
Home Office: +44 (0)1332 663964 (rarely used)
micheal.gardner@...

---

From: TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com [mailto:TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com] On Behalf Of Matt Moore
Sent: 19 June 2009 05:50
To: TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com
Subject: Re: [TaxoCoP] Re: taxonomies & master data management

The only note of caution I would sound is just to be clear on what you mean by "master data management". If you're talking about about a central repository of metadata terms then a taxonomy engine will do. If you're actually looking at data governance across different systems (which is what the MDM products by IBM, Oracle, SAP, etc claim to do) then you probably need something a bit more heavy duty. --- On Thu, 6/18/09, aredmondneal <aredmondneal@yahoo.com> wrote: From: aredmondneal <aredmondneal@yahoo.com> Subject: [TaxoCoP] Re: taxonomies & master data management To: TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com Date: Thursday, June 18, 2009, 9:13 PM Hi, Nick, I second Mike's recommendations about governance and ownership of thesaurus terms. He describes an excellent process. As for using a taxonomy tool to store the various types of data you outline, a taxonomy tool designed to comply with Z39.19 standards should meet your requirements. It must have a Scope Note field to capture your definition of a term, i.e. your interpretation of it within your domain. Ability to capture relationships is a given, a standard requirement within such a tool. Attributes and properties should also be handle-able as additional term record fields. As for customer, product, and location, these, too, should be easily captured in fields that are customizable in a strong thesaurus software tool. It's important to use a dedicated thesaurus/taxonomy software. I have often seen taxonomy projects limited by the constraints of taxonomy modules offered as part of a CMS. A CMS that doesn't support basic thesaurus features like related terms, synonyms, and polyhierarchy just doesn't work. And custom fields are far beyond such a limited tool/module. Stick with a dedicated thesaurus/taxonomy software tool that offers all these functions. Then it's no problem to capture all the bits of data you mention within the tool. Alice --- In TaxoCoP@yahoogroups .com, Nick Berry <infoglutton@ ...> wrote: > > Hi there, does anyone use their taxonomy tool as a system of record to store > reference data (like Customer, Product, Location, and > definitions/ relationships/ attributes/ properties/ aggregates thereof)? > How do you manage ownership, workflow, governance, change management, > lifecycle management, data quality, and data lineages? Do you use data > stewards for domains? > > I'm trying to make the case to use our taxonomy tool for this purpose (hey, > I'm a neutral party), but I've never seen it done before so I'm hoping to > hook up with someone who has experience with this and wouldn't mind some > occasional banter with me about it. > > Cheers, > Nick > > Nick Berry > Content Architect & Taxonomist > REI (Recreational Equipment, Inc.) > http://www.rei. com/ >

Hello,

I'm hoping this group can help me with a problem I'm facing. I recently started
a position as a librarian at a small business valuation firm, and we're in the
process of migrating the firm's catalogue of reports from InMagic DBTextWorks to
SharePoint. The previous librarian used NAICS to tag the relevant industry for
the reports the firm produces (the firm produces reports for clients in a
variety of industries). An issue that has come up from the users' perspective,
however, is that NAICS terminology is not intuitive or common and they often
can't find what they're looking for by industry.

As I don't intend to reclassify all the records with another taxonomy, I would
like to implement a thesaurus that maps onto NAICS for synonyms, related terms,
etc. Can anyone suggest such a product? Or is there a better way of going about
this?

Thanks in advance for any suggestions.

Marjan Farahbaksh
Cole & Partners
Toronto, Canada

Hi Marjan,

I know that some commercial information providers have created their own
mappings of terms to NAICS, such as Gale/Cengage, where I used to work.
They may not be for sale, but Cengage will sell some of its taxonomies,
if you look them up on Taxonomy Warehouse (www.taxonomywarehouse.com).
Yes, the best resource for off-the-shelf taxonomies is Taxonomy
Warehouse. I looked just now and found that Intelliscopic (which I don't
have any first-hand experience with) offers Intellisophic American
Industries Taxonomy "provides detailed topics, such as industry
overview, organization and structure, workforce, conditions, and
corresponding NAICS codes for over 6,000 SIC related industry sectors."
But I cannot recommend this, since I don't know it.

-- Heather


Heather Hedden
Hedden Information Management
Carlisle, MA
Heather@...
http://www.Hedden-Information.com



Marjan Farahbaksh wrote:
>
>
> Thanks very much for your quick response, Seth. I don't mind doing the
> mapping manually, but is there an off-the-shelf thesaurus that matches
> NAICS that I could purchase (and refine based on our needs)? If no
> such product exists, there's likely a market for it!
>
> Marjan
>
> On Fri, Jun 19, 2009 at 9:01 AM, Seth Earley <seth@...
> <mailto:seth@...>> wrote:
>
>
>
>     I would suspect that this process would need to be done manually.
>
>
>
>     You need to develop a more focused set of terms to present content
>     to users � the breadth and depth of the taxonomy will depend on
>     your corpus as well as user perspective.  You can then use a
>     spreadsheet to map metadata from one system to the other.
>
>
>
>     The mapping process is most time consuming,  Once you have mapped
>     from one taxonomy to the other, you would hand that off to your
>     technical staff to guide migration tagging.
>
>
>
>     Seth
>
>
>
>     *Seth Earley**
>     *President
>     _____________________________
>
>     *EARLEY** **&** **ASSOCIATES, Inc.*
>     Cell: 781-820-8080
>
>     Office: 781-444-0287
>     Email: seth@... <mailto:seth@...>
>     Web: www.earley.com <http://www.earley.com/>
>
>     Follow me on Twitter: sethearley
>
>
>
>     *From:* TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com <mailto:TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com>
>     [mailto:TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com <mailto:TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com>]
>     *On Behalf Of *causerie
>     *Sent:* Friday, June 19, 2009 8:35 AM
>     *To:* TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com <mailto:TaxoCoP@yahoogroups.com>
>     *Subject:* [TaxoCoP] Thesaurus for NAICS
>
>
>
>
>
>
>     Hello,
>
>     I'm hoping this group can help me with a problem I'm facing. I
>     recently started a position as a librarian at a small business
>     valuation firm, and we're in the process of migrating the firm's
>     catalogue of reports from InMagic DBTextWorks to SharePoint. The
>     previous librarian used NAICS to tag the relevant industry for the
>     reports the firm produces (the firm produces reports for clients
>     in a variety of industries). An issue that has come up from the
>     users' perspective, however, is that NAICS terminology is not
>     intuitive or common and they often can't find what they're looking
>     for by industry.
>
>     As I don't intend to reclassify all the records with another
>     taxonomy, I would like to implement a thesaurus that maps onto
>     NAICS for synonyms, related terms, etc. Can anyone suggest such a
>     product? Or is there a better way of going about this?
>
>     Thanks in advance for any suggestions.
>
>     Marjan Farahbaksh
>     Cole & Partners
>     Toronto, Canada
>
>
>
>
>

Best regards,

Ross A. Leher
CEO & Chairman
WAND, Inc.

rleher@...

http://www.wandinc.com

Office:  +1-303-623-7716
Mobile:  +1-303-887-3746
Fax:      +1-303-893-1574
Skype:  rleher
 
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