We have had quite a few nice new things happening in relation to LUCERO recently, including some updates of the code, initial work around aggregating data from multiple universities, a paper at a linked data workshop with people from several departments of the OU, presentations, etc. In other words, the work is continuing, and quite a lot more will be happening soon. In turns out indeed that we have not spent all of our budget and have some more time to spend on synthesising, factoring and making more directly reusable the work we have done as part of the project (don’t ask me how that happened…).
The idea here is therefore, starting from February 2012, to work on making our experience in LUCERO, in creating data.open.ac.uk, more directly accessible and reusable by other universities and colleges. The exciting bit about it is that, while we have been working mostly internally for the initial duration of the project, we will realise this new work in direct collaboration with two other universities: one that has already achieved a similar realisation as our own data.open.ac.uk (Southampton, working with Christopher Gutteridge), and one that is at the first, very initial steps of the process (Manchester, working with Sean Bechhofer).
More precisely, here is a quick description of the work, divided in workpackages:
WP1: Technical/Conceptual/Organisational process of deploying linked data in a University
The goal of this workpackage is to rely on our (joint) experience to describe and provide some guidelines regarding the different options related to the deployment, maintenance and sustainability of a linked data platform in a University. This includes in particular tasks such as the choice of vocabularies for data modelling, or the ways to establish links between internal and external datasets.
Deliverable: Report/Guidelines describing the concrete steps of deploying linked data in a university.
Duration: 12 days
WP2: Business case for linked data in universities
Nowadays, everything is driven by business cases and nothing happens with the direct approval and support from higher management. In this workpackage, we will compile a collection of common case studies demonstrating the benefits of linked data (whether it is to drive innovation, reduce cost of data management or create new entry points to the university’s online presence), and providing clear demonstrations of the business value of linked data.
Deliverables:A clearly illustrated, online collection of case studies with associated business cases for linked data in universities.
Duration: 12 days
WP3: Liaison with other universities involved in linked data
This workpackage contains the work related to the collaboration with other universities, including the organisation of face-to-face and online meetings, capturing their experiences and requirements, etc.
Deliverable: Meeting reports and descriptions of other universities’ linked data environments in comparison with data.open.ac.uk
Duration: 5 days
WP4: Dissemination and community portal
In this workpackage, we will rely on the experience in LUCERO in the use of blogs and twitter feeds to realise the dissemination of the results of the work. We will also make use and extend the LinkedUniversities.org portal to host the reports, guidelines and business cases produced as part of the work, and engage with the community around this documentation.
Deliverables:Extensions of the project blog, twitter feed and of the linkeduniversities.org portal
Duration: 5 days