About the concepts

The fundamental element of the SKOS vocabulary is the concept. Concepts are the units of thought —ideas, meanings, or (categories of) objects and events. We can add labels to our concept. There are two types of labels: Preferred Labels (skos:prefLabel) and Alternative Labels (skos:altLabel). Note that a concept can only have one preferred label per language but it can have many alternative labels. Now we can start to add semantic relationships. SKOS offers: hierarchical, associative and mapping relationships. The hierarchical relationships are skos:broader and skos:narrower. For example, the concept “Computer” is broader than the concept “Laptop.” Likewise, the concept “Laptop” is narrower than the concept ”Computer.” The basic tree structure of the SKOS Glossary is build with this two relationships, forming roots and branches in several levels. SKOS has also one associative relationship, skos:related, which is used to assert a relationship between two concepts. For example, the concept “Computer” is related to the concept “Software”. Using this relationship type interconnections outside the hierarchical structure of the glossary can be realized.

Functions of the Browser

Glossary root

In order to provide an efficient access to the entry points of broader/narrower concept hierarchies, SKOS defines a skos:hasTopConceptproperty. User can view all those Top concepts at once, to get an overview of all possible branches of the glossary, in pressing the top left button "Glossary Root".

Definition

Next to these structured characterizations, concepts sometimes have to be further defined using human-readable ("informal") documentation. The non-mandatory skos:definitionsupplies a complete explanation of the intended meaning of a concept. The visual mappers displays the definition of the current concept, as the right hand button "Definition" is clicked.

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The right hand button "Help" activates this help section.

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Related terms

Broader terms

Narrower terms

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