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Information Standards Quarterly


ISSN: 1041-0031

Winter 2012, v.24, no. 1

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Article Title: Standard Spotlight: From ISO 2788 to ISO 25964: the evolution of thesaurus standards towards interoperability and data modeling
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Authors: Stella G. Dextre Clarke and Marcia Lei Zeng
doi: http://dx.doi.org/10.3789/isqv24n1.2012.04
Citation: Clarke. Stella G. Dextre, and Marcia Lei Zeng. Standard Spotlight: From ISO 2788 to ISO 25964: the evolution of thesaurus standards towards interoperability and data modeling. Information Standards Quarterly, 2012 Winter 24(1):20-26.
Abstract: The information retrieval thesaurus emerged from pioneering work in the 1960s, and by 1974 the principles and practical guidance for constructing thesauri were enshrined in the international standard ISO 2788 as well as national standards such as ANSI/NISO Z39.19. Successive updates since then have led most recently to the publication of ISO 25964-1, Thesauri and interoperability with other vocabularies. Part 1: Thesauri for information retrieval. The authors review the reasons behind the development of thesauri; the dilemma that thesaurus standards have in differentiating between concepts and terms; the pressure for clarification through data models; the timeline of English thesaurus standards development; various national and international vocabulary standards development; the recently published Part 1 of the ISO 25964 standard, and further work underway including Part 2 of the ISO 25964 standard.
References and Links:
  • ANSI/NISO Z39.19-2005, Guidelines for the Construction, Format, and Management of Monolingual Controlled Vocabularies. Bethesda, MD: NISO Press. www.niso.org/standards/z39-19-2005/
  • Aitchison, J., and S.G. Dextre Clarke. The thesaurus: a historical viewpoint, with a look to the future. Cataloging & Classification Quarterly, 2004, 37(3/4): 5-21.
  • BS 8723 (2005-2008), Structured vocabularies for information retrieval - Guide. London: British Standards Institution. Parts 1-5. Part 1: Definitions, symbols and abbreviations (2005). Part 2: Thesauri (2005). Part 3: Vocabularies other than thesauri (2007). Part 4: Interoperability between vocabularies (2007). Part 5: Exchange formats and protocols for interoperability (2008).
  • BS 8723 Schema and Data Model (Part 5 of BS 8723 is also known as DD 8723-5). http://schemas.bs8723.org/Model.aspx
  • ISO 25964-1:2011, Thesauri and interoperability with other vocabularies. Part 1: Thesauri for information retrieval. Geneva: International Organization for Standards, August 8, 2011.
  • ISO 25964-1 Schema and Data Model. www.niso.org/schemas/iso25964/#schema
  • ISO 25964-2. Thesauri and interoperability with other vocabularies Part 2: Interoperability with other vocabularies. [In development; not yet published. Draft online until April 30, 2012 at http://drafts.bsigroup.com/]
  • Krooks, D.A., and F.W. Lancaster. The evolution of guidelines for thesaurus construction. Libri, 1993, 43(4): 326-342.
  • Milstead, Jessica. Report on the Workshop on Electronic Thesauri November 4-5, 1999. National Information Standards Organization, 1999. www.niso.org/news/events/niso/past/thesau99/thes99rprt.html
  • W3C Working Draft, SKOS Core Vocabulary Specification. W3C, May 10, 2005. www.w3.org/TR/2005/WD-swbp-skos-core-spec-20050510/
  • W3C Recommendation, SKOS Simple Knowledge Organization System Reference. W3C, August 18, 2009. www.w3.org/TR/skos-reference/
  • W3C Recommendation. SKOS eXtension for Labels (SKOS-XL). In: SKOS Simple Knowledge Organization System Reference, Appendix B. W3C, August 18, 2009. www.w3.org/TR/2009/REC-skos-reference-20090818/#xl