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Supporting Canada’s natural resources ministry in connecting data systems and simplifying vocabulary management for provincial and public sector stakeholders.
Discover how a major government natural resources ministry uses RDF export functionality to connect a controlled library vocabulary with a centralised geospatial data warehouse.
Land Information Ontario (LIO) became a program of the Ontario Ministry of Natural Resources over a decade ago.
Stakeholders include provincial ministries, broader public sector organisations and non-profit organisations. LIO provides services to stakeholders as well as private sector organisations and the public service.
Its mission has always been to facilitate access to geospatial data by way of various tools and services. These include:
“Land Information Ontario needed a flexible system to connect traditional library vocabularies with modern Semantic Web standards.
The solution had to support precise structural updates and export clean Resource Description Framework (RDF) files without disrupting existing infrastructure.”
Land Information Ontario recently undertook a substantial renewal of its geospatial applications and web services. This included the replacement of its metadata system. LIO used a controlled vocabulary in its previous tool that was derived from a thesaurus maintained by its library.
The new metadata tool provides LIO with the ability to import external thesauri but only in a specific format RDF* (Resource Description Framework). The old library thesaurus management tool did not support RDF, meaning that LIO needed to acquire a new tool capable of doing this while integrating into its current library system.
Delivering results for public administration, geospatial technology and information management industry sectors organisations like Land Information Ontario. Talk to our team
Soutron delivered the exact solution Land Information Ontario required. By collaborating closely with the client to understand their functional needs, our engineering team integrated a custom export function directly into the Soutron Thesaurus tool. Administrators now use this centralised interface to add, modify, and relate critical keywords before executing a seamless RDF export to generate importable metadata files.
The customisation and modifications made to the Thesaurus Tool has enabled LIO to integrate its thesaurus into its metadata system and makes it easier for users to access data. Here’s how:
Although no decisions have been made on expanding the usage of the Thesaurus Tool, LIO is aware that it includes a built-in workflow to empower users to register a keyword for approval.
In the future, this could be promoted to LIO’s metadata community to have users register for the addition of a new keyword rather than have these requests go to the metadata application administrator.
To learn more about Land Information Ontario, visit their website at: www.ontario.ca/page/geospatial-ontario
To find out how you can migrate to a fast, secure, cloud based information management system to support your public administration, book a 20 minute discovery call with us today, see below.
* RDF is the standard for encoding metadata and other knowledge on the Semantic Web. It is a method to decompose knowledge into small pieces with rules about the semantics, or meaning, of those pieces. It is structured so that computer applications can do useful things with the knowledge expressed in RDF. It represents knowledge or meaning, rather than just data.
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The first step is to learn more. Here's how we can answer your questions:
Traditional library tools often store controlled vocabularies in isolation from geographic information systems (GIS). A modern thesaurus management solution bridges this gap by supporting standard semantic data exports, such as the Resource Description Framework (RDF). This allows administrators to manage a unified controlled vocabulary in one place and import it cleanly into external metadata tools and data mapping environments.
RDF is the core standard for encoding metadata and relationships on the Semantic Web. Instead of storing keywords as flat text, RDF breaks down knowledge into structured, machine-readable pieces that define the exact meaning and relationship between terms. Using a thesaurus tool that exports to RDF ensures your controlled vocabulary can be fully understood and utilised by advanced geospatial discovery applications.
Yes. Purpose-built thesaurus tools allow information managers to establish intricate relationships between terms, including preferred terms, non-preferred terms, broader categories, and narrower concepts. This structured hierarchy helps standardise naming conventions across large corporate or government bodies, ensuring data remains discoverable even as databases scale.
Advanced solutions include built-in workflow engines that empower the broader user and research community to suggest new keywords directly through a structured registration process. This moves the workflow from a closed system to a controlled, collaborative environment, allowing users to propose terminology additions for administrator approval without creating bottlenecks.
