Just a note the I've released an update to WikiBrowser, and renamed it to ConceptMap as it now creates dynamic concept maps. ConceptMap is a web application that leverages the structure of Wikidata to semantically navigate Wikipedia articles and dynamically create directed graphs composed of items that you select. It is my hope that ConceptMap will be widely used by students and teachers of all ages for learning, research and teaching. I am developing ConceptMap in Java, using technologies such as Spring Boot, Spring Cloud, Spring Data, Neo4j, D3 and Cloud Foundry. This web application is live at ConceptMap.io and the code is open source and located in my GitHub repository. Here's a brief video that shows features of ConceptMap v1.1. In honor and memory of David Bowie, this video constructs a concept map of an infinitesimally tiny portion of his amazing legacy:
ConceptMap v1.1 Demo - Dynamically creating a concept map from James L. Weaver on Vimeo.
You can open the ConceptMap application with the David Bowie concept map created in the video by clicking this link. One of the core features of ConceptMap is the synchronized navigation between Wikipedia articles and their Wikidata semantic relationships. In the brief video, for example, the Wikipedia article named "David Bowie" is displayed in the rightmost panel. The semantic relationships defined in Wikidata for David Bowie (whose Wikidata identifier is "Q5383") are displayed in the center panel. The user can see the items related to David Bowie (e.g. All the Young Dudes), as well as the relevant Wikidata properties (e.g. performer). When the user clicks on a related item, the Wikipedia article for that item appears in the rightmost panel. Conversely, when the user clicks an article link in a Wikipedia page, the center panel is updated to show the relationships defined in the Wikidata item corresponding to that article. This synchronized navigation feature enables the user to explore areas of interest using an approach that combines structured (Wikidata relationships) and freeform (Wikipedia links) navigation.
Another core feature of ConceptMap is the dynamically created directed graph in the leftmost panel. When a Wikipedia article is displayed and its corresponding Wikidata item appears in the title area, the "Pin item" checkbox may be used to pin/unpin the item from the concept map. Each of the pinned items appear as labeled circles (nodes) in the concept map. As items are added to the graph, relationships from Wikidata are displayed as labeled lines (links) between the nodes.
As shown in the video, the Wikidata icon in the upper right portion of the page opens the Wikidata page for the selected item. This is useful for adding missing relationships to Wikidata, as shown in the video when adding "space rock" to the list of genres for his song entitled Space Oddity. To share or bookmark a concept map, click the button with the link icon as shown in the video. A shortened URL appears that you can copy.
In future posts I plan to share details of the technologies and code involved in creating this application. In the meantime, whether you are a learner, researcher, teacher, or all of the above, I hope that you'll take it for a spin!
Regards,
James Weaver
Twitter: @JavaFXpert
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