Semantic Web: a State of the Art Survey

Abstract

The semantic web i.t an extension of the current web in which infonnation is given well-defined meaning. It is a concept that enables better machine processing of information on the web, by structuring documents written for the web in such a way that they become understandable by computers. This can be used for creating complex applications such as intelligent browsers, intelligent .software agents, global databases with data from the web. reuse of information, etc. Central to the vision of the semantic web are ontologies. Ontologies provide a shared understanding of a domain of interest to support communication among human and .software agents, typically being represented in a machine-processable representation language. Web ontology languages like OWL provide a technological basis to enable the .semantic web. Tbis paper considers the basic principles of the .semantic web, and reviews important tools for creating and maintaining ontologies in various frameworks