University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada

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Abstract—In the construction industry, there is a pressing need for computer systems that will facilitate information exchange and knowledge sharing among all industry practitioners. The Social Semantic Web Portal (SSWP) proposed in this paper will accomplish three tasks: (1) the streamlining of information exchange about any individual project, (2) the encouragement of knowledge sharing in general, and (3) the virtual grouping of people with similar interests to form communities of practice. A domain ontology is developed in order to encapsulate knowledge about industrial actors and their roles in relation to sibling ontologies that conceptualize construction products and processes. This domain ontology is then tailored to be the cornerstone (the knowledge base) that will enable the semantics of Web services. The concept of the Social Web is employed to validate knowledge items and to connect users with similar interests. The information flow is realized through a content-based publish/subscribe system. The SSWP will semantically connect a user with knowledge items and socially link a user to his/her peers.

Index Terms—Ontology, information exchange, knowledge sharing, infrastructure, Semantic Web, Social Web, Publish/subscribe system, Web services.

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Cite: Jinyue Zhang, Tamer E . El-Diraby, "SSWP: A Social Semantic Web Portal for Effective Communication in Construction," Journal of Computers vol. 4, no. 4, pp. 330-337, 2009.