Preparing University Heritage for Semantic Data Enrichment The Virtual Museum of the University of Barcelona
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Abstract
The creation of a virtual museum today must engage with the semantic web and linked data; it cannot be developed independently of the standards that shape its technological environment. The Virtual Museum of the University of Barcelona, launched in 2021, was conceived with these principles in mind, despite the complexity of its collections which encompass numerous and highly diverse forms of material, immaterial, natural, and human heritage, all managed by faculty members alongside their research, teaching, and administrative duties. This paper presents the process of developing the virtual museum, with particular attention to its material cultural heritage component. It begins by describing the data-modelling work, including the creation of a DCMI application profile informed by the CIDOC-CRM conceptual model. This effort required integrating sector-specific controlled vocabularies adapted for a linked-open-data (LOD) environment, as well as producing a data dictionary for collection managers. The article then discusses the data-cleaning and reconciliation procedures carried out to produce manageable data subsets for curators and to prepare the records for future semantic enrichment. The paper concludes by outlining the remaining tasks and upcoming initiatives aimed at enhancing the museum’s metadata through semantic technologies.
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