Semantic Web Enabled Web Services

Abstract

Currently, computers are changing from single, isolated devices into entry points to a worldwide network of information exchange and business transactions called the World Wide Web. However, the easy information access based on the success of the web has made it increasingly difficult to find, present, and maintain the information required by a wide variety of users. In response to this problem, many new research initiatives and commercial enterprises have been set up to enrich available information with machine-understandable semantics. This semantic web will provide intelligent access to heterogeneous, distributed information, enabling software products to mediate between user needs and the information sources available. Web Services tackle with an orthogonal limitation of the current web. It is mainly a collection of information but does not yet provide support in processing this information, i.e., in using the computer as a computational device. Recent efforts around UDDI, WSDL, and SOAP try to lift the web to a new level of service. Software programs can be accessed and executed via the web. However, all these service descriptions are based on semi-formal natural language descriptions. Therefore, the human programmer need be kept in the loop and scalability as well as economy of web services are limited. Bringing them to their full potential requires their combination with semantic web technology. It will provide mechanization in service identification, configuration, comparison, and combination. Semantic Web enabled Web Services have the potential to change our life in a much higher degree as the current web already did.