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Unified Astronomy Thesaurus
Bringing Together People, Terms, and Organizations to Classify Infinity
...and Beyond!
Justin Soles, McGill UniversityKatie Frey, John G. Wolbach Library
Data Harmony User Group MeetingFebruary 20, 2013
● Context and History
● Unified Astronomy Thesaurus (UAT)
● Update Process
● User Feedback and Interest
● Thesaurus Tools
Agenda
● Scientific controlled vocabularies are nothing new
● Each discipline has its own vocabulary:○ MeSH (Medicine)○ IEEE Thesaurus (Engineering)○ PACS (R.I.P.)
Context & History
Major vocabularies for Astronomy & Astrophysics:
○ Astronomical Subject Keyword list○ Physics and Astronomy Classification Scheme
(PACS)○ International Astronomical Union (IAU) Thesaurus
● So if scientific & astronomical vocabularies are so common, why is UAT special?
Context & History
Summary of astronomy/astrophysics vocabs:
Context & History
Astronomical Subject Keywords
PACS (Astro. sections)
IAU-93 Thesaurus
Term Count: 374 589 2,551
Top-level concepts: 13 6 274
Vocabulary type: List w/a loose hierarchy
4-level hierarchy Thesaurus
Main use: Indexing Indexing Reference
Update Frequency: biannually (approx.) biannually 1993, 1995
Notes: last updated Oct. 2009 (AAS website)
retired in 2010 (AIP website)
officially adopted by IAU in 1993
Q: IAU-93 thesaurus is much bigger and more structured than PACS or Astronomy Journal keyword list, so why isn't it used for article indexing?
Context & History
Q: IAU-93 thesaurus is much bigger and more structured than PACS or Astronomy Journal keyword list, so why isn't it used for article indexing?
Let's find out!
Context & History
IAU93:http://www.mso.anu.edu.au/library/thesaurus/
AIP PACS: http://www.aip.org/pacs/pacs2010/individuals/pacs2010_regular_edition/reg90.htm#95
Astronomy Subject Keywords:http://aas.org/authors/astronomical-subject-keywords-update-october-2009
Dark Energy, Exoplanets, & Higgs Boson
● Current state of IAU-93 Thesaurus:○ Hasn't been updated since 1995○ Missing terms important in modern astronomy ○ No mechanism to keep thesaurus updated with
new terms and relationships
● Current state of Astronomical Journal Keywords/PACS vocabulary:○ Updated biannually ○ Astronomy terms added from literature○ Established mechanism to keep vocabulary
updated
Context & History
● UAT prompted by the 'retirement' of PACS and desire to provide better tools for users
● Each publisher had started project to develop a PACS replacement vocabulary
... but ...decided to work together once they found out about each other's projects
Context & History
UAT vision/mission statement:
“…an open, interoperable and community-supported thesaurus which unifies the existing divergent and isolated Astronomy & Astrophysics thesauri into a single high-quality, freely-available open thesaurus formalizing astronomical concepts and their inter-
relationships.”(http://astrothesaurus.org, 2012)
UAT Introduction
UAT is different from prior vocabularies in terms of:
○ Update process and frequency○ Management/Governance ○ Level of community engagement○ Intended uses
UAT Introduction
Overview:
Update Process
UAT's update process leverages expertise of astro. community in several ways:
○ Suggest new terms, concepts from the current scientific literature/work
○ Identify structural problems with the thesaurus and recommend solutions
○ Review suggestions and recommendations and decide whether to implement or not
Update Process
Update Process
● Community involvement does not mean UAT is an 'Astronomy folksonomy'!
● Librarian(s) have key roles in UAT as:○ Gardeners○ Facilitators○ Liaison Officers○ User Advocates
Update Process
Potential Benefits:● Identification of new terms and issues● Subject-matter expertise● Intellectual rigor during review● Virtuous cycle of community engagement
Possible Risks:● Volume overwhelms available resources● Collective community yawn and disengagement
Update Process
UAT management and governance structure comprises 2 groups:
● Stewardship group○ responsible for UAT's overall direction and sets
long-term goals
● Operations and Outreach (O&O) group○ responsible for UAT's day-to-day operations and
for implementing goals set by Stewardship group
● Librarian acts as liaison between groups
Management & Governance
Standard Terminology
Standard Terminology
Standard Terminology
Standard Terminology
Standard Terminology
Terrestrial Planets?
Standard Terminology
Terrestrial Planets?Inner Planets
Standard Terminology
Increase Findability
Increase Findability
Increase Findability
Increase Findability
Initial Interest
http://ioppublishing.org/newsDetails/new-thesaurus-created-for-the-astronomy-community
Categorize terms into three buckets:
1. Astronomical Objects○ such as Mars, black holes, neutron stars
2. Astronomical & Astrophysical Concepts○ such as the Big Bang, stellar evolution, mass
transfer3. Observational Methods & Instrumentation
○ such as telescopes, CCD cameras, statistical analysis
Results from our Initial Surveys
● Process vs. Tools has been a major debate within UAT community○ Q: Do you focus first on process and then tools,
or define tools and then process?
● Result: toolset is still in flux although some parts of toolset have been established
(suggestions are welcome)
Tools
Toolset:
Tools
HIVE WordPressGoogle Groups
Request Tracker
Thesaurus Master
Primary Purpose
Main browser for UAT
Platform for UAT website, blog & news
Host discussion forums
Manage user suggestions
Manage UAT structure and generate files
Public or Private?
Public only Public only Public and Private
Public and private
Private only
Open Source?
Yes No No Preferred No
URL hive.nescent.org:9090/ConceptBrowser.html
wordpress.com groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/uat-users
N/A www.dataharmony.com/products/thesaurus_master.html
Tools
Request Tracker
Questions?
Contact Us:
http://astrothesaurus.org
Justin Soles Katie [email protected] [email protected]
