On Thu, 20 Oct 2005, Dan Hanks wrote:
As an example, consider the church's digitization efforts for its microfilm.
Imagine every image generated by this digitization had a unique id, and could
be displayed/retrieved by a certain web service call, or simply
by a unique url. Web service calls could also then be available which would
provide metadata about this image, which document did it come from, when was
it created, what geographical areas did it come from, what surnames are
mentioned in the image, etc.
Sorry to respond to my own post, but my ideas are flowing. Some of you may
be familiar with del.icio.us, a web-based bookmark manager. Users can post
urls and associate any number of 'tags' with these urls. A tag is simply a
single word associated with the url in question.
Imagine then a service like del.icio.us that tied into this hypothetical
system the church could develop around its digitized microfilm images
in which users could associate any number of tags with a particular image.
Although the church through its extraction efforts will be indexing the
actual text of each image, such a service (which wouldn't have to be
developed or maintained by the church) could allow people to add useful
metadata to each image. Essentialy a folksonomy[1] centered around the
digitized images.
Taking this a step further, one could build a service around this
hypothetical API such that users could create RDF "semantic-web"[2] data
associated with each image, such as "John Doe was born in Sussex, England
in 1815", which would then be machine-readable, and much in the same way
proofs can be deduced in a relational database based on the basic
information stored in relations. Imagine being able to query "show me all
images for a John Doe born in Sussex, England within 5 years of 1815".
The same "semantic annotation" (via RDF) could be done for family tree
information as well.
It's my firm belief that there are applications that will surface which we
can't even imagine at this time that will be possible with open APIs such as
these.
Just some (more) thoughts.
-- Dan
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Folksonomy
[2] http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/
With that interface exposed I could tie it up with, say, google maps, so that
I could browse a map and show pinpoints of any microfilm images that
originated in a certain area.
What if family tree navigation (think Ancestral File) were opened up via API?
I could tie it up with Google maps to show migration routes of my ancestors
with each suceeding generation. I imagine somewhere there's a web service
that offers timelines of historical events. I could tie this family tree
navigation with that and get a nice timeline of events in my ancestors lives
contrasted with world events.
Let's say I go on a crusade to snap photos of all the tombstones of my
ancestors that I can find. I store these images on my server, and write an
app that allows a visitors to browse my family trees that I've submitted to
the church, and with each individual able to display the mages I've taken of
their tombstone.
These ideas are only the tip of the iceberg, so to speak, of what could be
possible with open APIs exposing this data. I'm sure there are hundreds and
thousands of tools that could be created to enhance genealogical research, if
the data were exposed via some form of API. In this way, the church could
develop their own basic interface around the service, and not have to spend
development time implementing every last little obsucre feature in a desktop
application. Let those who really want it write an app or extension to
provide that feature.
At any rate, that's what I'm interested in. :-)
-- Dan
On Thu, 20 Oct 2005, Charles Fry wrote:
Hey,
I don't mean to disrupt the mailing list peace, but I've noticed a
recent influx of new members. I, for one, would be quite interested in
learning who you are, how you found LDSOSS, what motivated you to join
the list, and what you hope to get from the group.
In any case, welcome, and we hope you enjoy it here!
Charles
--
If our road signs
Catch your eye
Smile
But don't forget
To buy
Burma-Shave
http://burma-shave.org/jingles/1963/if_our_road
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