GWC 2008

SemanticNet: a WordNet-based Tool for the Navigation
of Semantic Information
Manuela Angioni, Roberto Demontis, Massimo Deriu, and Franco Tuveri
CRS4 - Center for Advanced Studies, Research and Development in Sardinia, Polaris -
Edificio 1, 09010 Pula (CA), Italy
{angioni, demontis, deriu, tuveri}@crs4.it
Abstract. The main aim of the DART search engine is to index and retrieve
information both in a generic and in a specific context where documents can be
mapped or not on ontologies, vocabularies and thesauri. To achieve this goal, a
semantic analysis process on structured and unstructured parts of documents is
performed. While the unstructured parts need a linguistic analysis and a
semantic interpretation performed by means of Natural Language Processing
(NLP) techniques, the structured parts need a specific parser. In this paper we
illustrate how semantic keys are extracted from documents starting from
WordNet and used by an automatic tool in order to define a new semantic net
called SemanticNet build enriching the WordNet semantic net with new nodes,
links and attributes. Formulating the query through the search engine, the user
can move through the SemanticNet and extracts the concepts which really
interest him, limiting the search field and obtaining a more specific result by
means of a dedicated tool called 3DUI4SemanticNet.
Keywords: Semantic net, Ontologies, NLP, 3D User Interface.
1 Introduction
The main aim of the DART ([1] and [2]) project is to realize a distributed architecture
for a semantic search engine, facing the user with relevant resources in reply to a
query about a specific domain of interest. In this paper we expose concepts and
solutions related to the semantic aspects and to the geo-referencing features, designed
to support the user in the information retrieval and to supply position based
information strictly related to a specified area.
In order to reach this goal, a prototype able to enrich the WordNet [3] semantic net
by means of new concepts often related to specific knowledge domains has been
realized as part of the DART project[4]. This aspect of the problem bring us to
distinguish between a specific and a generic context both in indexing and in retrieval
of information, whether documents can be mapped or not on ontologies, vocabularies
and thesauri.
The paper deals with two main aspects. The first is the definition of a semantic net,
called SemanticNet, and the definition of a 3D user interface, called
3DUI4SemanticNet, that allows to navigate in the concepts through relations. The
second puts in evidence the use of ontologies or structure descriptors, as in the case of