Ontologies and the Semantic Web: Problems and Perspectives for LIS Professionals Ontologies and the semantic web: problems and perspectives for LIS professionals

Nowadays, many Library & Information Science (LIS) professionals still do not know their precise role in the development of the Semantic Web, especially those aspects concerning ontologies. This paper intends to contribute clarifying this issue in a twofold manner: 1) identifying main trends, issues and problems concerning ontology research; and 2) identifying possible contributions from the LIS area to the development of ontologies for the semantic web. To do so, a thorough literature review based on searches in international databases (LISA, SCI, SSCI, ACM Digital Library and IEEE Explore) is carried out. Then, the paper presents a discussion of the main trends, issues and problems concerning ontology research. Recommendations of possible LIS contributions to the development of ontologies for the semantic web are finally presented.

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