Linked Data Exploration with RDF Surveyor

Abstract

Linked Data exploration is an essential task in the process of understanding, assessing, and using datasets made available in the Resource Description Framework (RDF) format. Current solutions for exploration of RDF data are mainly targeted at Semantic Web experts, require non-trivial deployments, and do not scale to the increasing amounts of data published in RDF. The lack of simple, intuitive, and efficient solutions for exploring RDF data, especially for lay users, is the main motivation behind the work presented in this paper. We propose RDF Surveyor, an easy-to-use and lightweight tool for exploring RDF datasets. Its visual interface hides the intricacies of Semantic Web technologies from the user, while providing intuitive overviews of datasets, class navigation, and visualization of class instances. Furthermore, RDF Surveyor does not require any installation and can handle large datasets such as DBpedia. We provide a detailed overview of RDF Surveyor and illustrate its capabilities in two different scenarios. We also analyze the uptake, performance and usability of RDF Surveyor, showing its suitability for exploring Linked Data at scale.