Dereferencing Service for Navigating Enterprise Knowledge Structures from Diagrammatic Representations

Abstract

This paper aims to offer a straightforward solution to the need of cross-diagram semantic navigation in business diagrams while it also emphasizes the potential and importance of a core Linked Data concept which has yet to gain widespread recognition or implementation, the dereferencing. Business process models that are exported as queryable data in graph databases, using the Resource Description Framework (RDF) for enterprise data storage and retrieval, so that resources have HTTP identifiers which can be interpreted as Web locations (URLs) to gain direct access to a resource instead of querying it. The work at hand implements the URI dereferencing concept through RESTful services. A specific business example will be discussed to demonstrate the new way of accomplishing navigation between diagrammatic enterprise knowledge structures outside the modelling tool, thus making model elements queryable in an external environment.