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CALL FOR PAPERS
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Workshop on Semantic Data Management (SemData)
http://semdata.org/events/2010/vldb/

At the 36th International Conference on Very Large Data Bases
http://www.vldb2010.org

Singapore: 13 - 17 Sept 2010, Grand Copthorne Waterfront Hotel
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WORKSHOP INTRODUCTION AND OBJECTIVES
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The Semantic Web represents the next generation Web of Data, where information
is published and interlinked in order to facilitate the exploitation of its
structure and meaning for both humans and machines. Semantic Web applications
require database management systems for the handling of structured data, taking
into consideration the models used to represent semantics. To foster the
realization of the Semantic Web, the World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) developed
a set of metadata models, ontology models, and query languages. Today, most of
the Semantic Web repositories are database engines, which store data
represented in RDF, support SPARQL queries, and can interpret schemata and
ontologies represented in RDFS and OWL. We are thus at the point where the
adoption of semantic technologies is growing. However, these technologies often
appear to be immature, and tend to be too expensive or risky to deploy in real
business. Solid data management layer concepts, architectures, and tools are
important to everyone in the semantic ecosystem, and creating them requires a
strong community, with a critical mass of involvement.

Semantic data management refers to a range of techniques for the manipulation
and usage of data based on its meaning. It enables sustainable solutions for a
range of IT environments, where the usage of today's mainstream technology is
either inefficient or entirely unfeasible: enterprise data integration, life
science research, data sharing in SaaS architectures, querying linked data on
the Web. In a nutshell, semantic data management fosters the economy of
knowledge, facilitating more comprehensive usage of larger scale and more
complex datasets at lower cost.

The goal of the SemData workshop is to provide a platform for the discussion
and investigation of various aspects related to semantic databases and data
management in the large. Many of the semantic data management challenges
cumulate in the need for scalable and performing database solutions for
semantic data, a building block that runs largely behind comparable
non-semantic technologies. In order to make semantic technologies take on the
targeted market share, it is indispensable that technological progress allows
semantic repositories to reach near performance parity with some of the best
RDBMS solutions without having to omit the advantages of a higher query
expressivity compared to basic key-value stores, or the higher schema
flexibility compared to the relational model. It is time that one must no
longer pay a heavy price in terms of longer run times or more expensive
equipment for profiting from the flexibility of the generic physical model
underlying the semantic graph-based structures of RDF. We also recognize that
there will always be a burden with more flexibility. Hence, the goal is to
minimize the drawbacks and maximize the advantages of the semantic RDF-minded
repositories.

TOPICS AND APPLICATIONS
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The SemData workshop seeks trans-disciplinary expert discussions on issues such
as semantic repositories, their virtualization and distribution, and
interoperability with related database solutions such as relational, XML, graph
databases or others. We thus welcome original academia and industry papers or
project descriptions that propose innovative approaches for semantic data
management in the large, with a particular focus on semantic database solutions
including their virtualization and distribution.

The topics of interest of this workshop include but are not limited to:
* semantic repositories and databases: storage facilities for semantic artifacts,
RDF repositories, reasoning supported data management infrastructures, data
base schemas optimized for semantic data, indexing structures, storage density
and performance improvements
* distribution, interoperability, and benchmarking: "Classical" semantic storage
subjects: distributed repositories (data partitioning, replication, and
federation); interoperability and integration with RDBMS; performance
evaluation and benchmarking
* virtualized semantic repositories: identification and composition of (fragments
of) datasets in a manner, abstracting the applications from the specific setup
of the data management service (e.g. local vs. remote and distribution)
* semantic data bus: a communication layer bridging the gap between the data
layer and the application layer
* embedded data processing: "move the processing close to the data" mechanisms,
allowing application-specific data processing to be performed within the
semantic repository, e.g. stored procedures and engine extension APIs
* adaptive indexing and multi-modal retrieval: strategies for dynamic
materialization towards specific data- and query-patterns; indexing structures
for specific types of data and queries (FTS, co-occurrence, concordance,
temporal, spatial)

IMPORTANT DATES
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Paper Submission Deadline May 21, 2010
Acceptance Notification June 21, 2010
Camera Ready July 11, 2010
SemData Workshop September 17, 2010

SUBMISSION AND PROCEEDINGS
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The papers must be submitted in the VLDB format; please see
http://vldb2010.org/ppp.htm. Submissions that do not comply with the formatting
detailed for VLDB will be rejected without review. The paper length is limited
to 6 pages.

CO-CHAIRS
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Karl Aberer
Distributed Information Systems Laboratory LSIR
Ecole Politechnique Federale de Lausanne, Switzerland

Reto Krummenacher
Semantic Technology Institute STI
University of Innsbruck, Austria

Atanas Kiryakov
Ontotext AD, Sofia, Bulgaria

Rajaraman Kanagasabai
Data Mining Department
Institute for Infocomm Research, Singapore

CONTACT
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Web: http://semdata.org/events/2010/vldb/
Email: reto.krummenacher@sti2.at
Phone: +43 (0)512 507 6452
Fax: +43 (0)512 507 94906452