Linked Data Driven Dynamic Web Services for Providing Multilingual Access to Diverse Japanese Humanities Databases

Abstract

Several cultural domain resources in different languages have become available as Linked Open Data (LOD) in the last few years. However, there is little re-use of this data in multilingual information retrieval applications. The paper discusses Linked Data driven approaches in providing integrated multilingual access to diverse Japanese humanities databases by linking and re-using LOD resources dynamically. It proposes a method, which dynamically generates links across databases using Linked Data when a user performs a search using keywords. We built a prototype information retrieval system based on LOD resources, personal names authority data, subject headings, and links to other Linked Data resources. Furthermore, we demonstrate how this approach is integrated in real-life retrieval systems and how linking and accessing diverse databases can be enhanced to make use of the available LOD resources. The proposed method also enables to access multiple databases in different languages by using the notations in various languages, which were obtained from the authority data resources. It allows to access to additional data not only in Japanese databases but also multilingual databases in other countries without depending on languages and formats of each database.