Design an extensible metadata editor based on RDF

Abstract

The content of a Learning Object is frequently characterized bymetadata from several standards, such as LOM, SCORM and QTI.Specialized domains require new application profiles that further complicatethe task of editing the metadata of learning object since their data models arenot supported by existing authoring tools. To cope with this problem wedesigned a metadata editor supporting multiple metadata languages, eachwith its own data model. It is assumed that the supported languages have anXML binding and we use RDF to create a common metadata representation,independent from the syntax of each metadata languages. The combineddata model supported by the editor is defined as an ontology. Thus, theprocess of extending the editor to support a new metadata language istwofold: firstly, the conversion from the XML binding of the metadatalanguage to RDF and vice-versa; secondly, the extension of the ontology tocover the new metadata model. In this paper we describe the generalarchitecture of the editor, we explain how a typical metadata language forlearning objects is represented as an ontology, and how this formalizationcaptures all the data required to generate the graphical user interface of theeditor.