The near-term framework for linked data at Penn Libraries involves building staff skills and expertise in linked data; researching effective workflows, tools, and collaborations for linked data management; and enhancing and extending existing data models and systems using hybrid linked data to improve discovery. Aspects of this hybrid approach include introducing linked data alongside existing data structures like MARC.
Library staff have worked on several projects to create and manage linked data and improve their skills in it. In collaboration with the Program for Cooperative Cataloging (PCC), staff have enhanced Wikidata with information on serials and on Penn departments, to support our Deep Backfile copyright project and to lay the groundwork for collecting information on publications and other work of Penn scholars. Staff have also trained, experimented with, and consulted on the design of Sinopia for describing bibliographic resources with linked data. The Digital Scriptorium 2.0 project is maintaining information on library manuscript holdings using linked data on a Wikibase instance. Along with manually editing linked data, several library staff also have used automated or semi-automated tools to create, manage, and retrieve linked data, including OpenRefine, QuickStatements, SPARQL queries, and RDF-generating scripts. Several members of IPC are involved in a focus group for implementing linked data in Alma production. The IPC efforts include cataloging in linked data, exporting to Alma Sandbox, and evaluating the possibilities for production workflow with BIBFRAME data in Alma.
The “Possible Linked Data Connections at Penn” image shows preliminary ideas we have on how linked data workflows might work at Penn.
Possible augmentations of discovery functionality using linked data include the following:
