 |
|
DAILY NEWS AND INFORMATION
FOR THE GLOBAL GRID COMMUNITY / JUNE 16, 2003: VOL. 2 NO. 24
|
Applications:
MCDONALD BRADLEY TAKES LEAD IN
NEXT GENERATION OF THE WEB
McDonald Bradley, Inc. (MBI), a rapidly-growing information technology
solutions provider to the government marketplace, announced that the
projects the Company is working on for the Department of Defense are setting
the stage for what will become the next generation of the Web. Chief
Scientist, Advanced Programs Group Michael Daconta and Principal Software
Architect Kevin Smith, explore the implications of these new, transformational
technological concepts the Company is spearheading in a new book recently
released by Wiley Publishing, Inc. -- The Semantic Web: A Guide to the Future
of XML, Web Services, and Knowledge Management.
The "semantic" web is the evolution of the current web to make it usable by
machines -- not just people. In order to accomplish this, it places reliance
and importance on the meaning of words (called semantics) -- not simply the
matching of words that occurs today when a user submits a query. By
eliminating the reliance on word matches, and inserting structure to the
information that is stored, the door opens for "machine to machine" use of
web. This machine processing requires the meaning of information to be
formally and logically expressed to software programs.
This evolution is underway in the Company's work on both the Virtual
Knowledge
Base (VKB) and Net-Centric Enterprise Services (NCES) projects at the DOD. In
the first, MBI is creating a framework for integrating information stored in
many different repositories of data, such as intelligence, surveillance and
reconnaissance information, so military users and software search "agents"
will be able to search everything at one time and display it on the fly in
previously unavailable combinations. In the second, the Company is creating
the ability to understand the context of military queries. For example, doing
a search on a grid coordinate will be automatically recognized as a location
instead of a random string of numbers, thereby displaying a map of that
precise point on the ground.
"We are excited about the groundbreaking advances our team is making on the
DOD project, and this new book sets the stage for CIOs everywhere to take note
how this next generation in the technology will yield vast increases in
workforce productivity," said Kenneth Bartee, President, MBI. "This book by
our employees introduces the revolutionary aspects of our work, and in doing
so, sheds light on what business and industry can soon expect in how business
processes will continue to be transformed on the Web."
The Semantic Web introduces, explains and explores revolutionary concepts
invented by the authors like the "Smart Data Continuum," "Semantic Levels,"
"Non-contextual Modeling", and "Combinatorial Experimentation" and how these
concepts apply to today's business environment. Further, the book reveals the
return-on-investment (ROI) for semantic web initiatives and other aspects of
the business case for adopting semantic web technologies. Finally, it offers a
clear, step-by-step roadmap to preparing for and implementing semantic web
technologies today.
"I predict that large enterprises will be incorporating these semantic web
technologies into their intranets and portals at a pace such that in the next
2-3 years, we will begin to see a transformation from haphazard knowledge
management to the knowledge-centered organization," said Mr. Daconta.
The book is directed to CIOs, senior executives and technical managers and
is
the first one of its kind that explains all the components of the semantic web
as well as the role and relationship of current technologies.
Mr. Daconta will be a featured guest at a special reception and book
signing
for The Semantic Web sponsored by the Company on Wednesday, June 11 at the
Washington Convention Center during the E-Gov 2003 conference. It starts at
4:00 pm in Room 159B. He will also deliver a convention address on the topic
of the semantic web on Thursday, June 12, at 2:20 pm in the Homeland Security
Pavilion Theatre.
This latest book by Mr. Daconta, an international and well-respected
authority
on programming, represents the tenth technical book he has published in ten
years.
|