I have just discovered the concept of ‘Semantic Web’, having been doing some research into developing a more intelligent search engine for building product specification. Although this seems to be in it’s early stages (even though it was coined back in 1999 by the father of the Web himself, Tim Berners-Lee) this seems to be the natural way forward.

It seems, in my experience, that the Building Industry is very backward with regards to IT as I cannot find any real reference anywhere to the use of Semantic Web in Building Product Specification – correct me if i’m wrong.

If computers could ‘understand’ the meaning of a search term, using Ontologies, then the possibilities are endless. Some even feel that Semantic Web will be the defining feature of ‘Web 3.0′.

Article on ‘The Semantic Web’ by Tim Berners-Le et al at http://www.sciam.com/article.cfm?id=the-semantic-web&print=true

The Semantic Web – An Introduction: http://infomesh.net/2001/swintro/

W3C Semantic Web Activity: http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/