Project Overview NASA Taxonomy Development Phase 1 July to Sept 2002

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Project OverviewNASA Taxonomy DevelopmentPhase
1 July to Sept 2002
Joseph Busch, Taxonomy StrategiesJayne Dutra,
Jet Propulsion LaboratoryFebruary, 2003
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Purpose of the NASA Taxonomy
Finding the right information at the right time
to solve the problem at hand
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Project BenefitsEnable Knowledge Discovery

• Make it easy for various audiences to find
  relevant information from NASA programs quickly
• Provide one stop shopping for NASA resources
  through web space directories.
• Share knowledge by enabling users to easily find
  links to databases and tools.
• Provide search results targeted to user
  interests.
• Comply with E-Government Act of 2002.
• Be a leading participant in federal XML projects.

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Project Benefits NASA Taxonomy Best Practices

• Design process that
• Incorporates existing federal and industry
  terminology standards like NASA AFS, NAICS, SOC,
  ACM Classification, and LOM.
• Provides for NASA XML namespace registry (DISA).
• Complies with metadata standards like Z39.19, ISO
  2709, and Dublin Core.
• Practices increase interoperability and
  extensibility.

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Design Approach

• Map the wealth of NASA content assets into
  logical and intuitive groupings that allow users
  to intuitively navigate to the content they need.

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Project ProgressInitial Taxonomy Results

• Phase 2
• Build community of practice
• Agree on comprehensive branches taxonomy detail

• Phase 1
• Audit Content practices
• Identify survey stakeholder

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Objectives of Phases 1-2

• Understand current strategies and practices for
  creating, collecting, and organizing information
  across NASA.
• Observe how information is used and organized,
  the audiences for this information, and the
  information needs of these audiences.
• Elicit goals, hopes, and concerns for an
  information architecture solution.
• Start building a community of interest.

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Key Findings

• Most (70) NASA content already has some tagging
  or is categorized.
• Most (70) owners add tag content with metadata.
• Almost half (45) use a standard metadata schema,
  but many different standards are used.
• Most (60) use a controlled vocabulary, but lots
  of different controlled vocabularies are used.
• Different NASA constituencies care deeply about
  what schemas are specified, and what vocabularies
  are used because

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Audiences for NASA Content are Diverse
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Audience Uses Vary Widely
Admin

• Better understand the program in total, and
  obtain scheduling information, project status and
  best practices.
• Access procurement rules and examples, and
  procurement action synopses.
• Engineering specifications.
• Scholarly research, competitive intelligence, and
  general aerospace research.
• Develop educational products, support current
  products, learn, etc.
• Topic research and fact finding, topic background
  research, and downloading curriculum support
  materials.
• In the classroom as stand alone items, hands-on
  learning opportunities, class projects, to expand
  on a students learning potential.
• Find NASA contact information on services,
  information about student opportunities,
  information about career opportunities, and
  latest educational news.

Sci Tech
Outreach
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Taxonomy Basics

• What is the NASA Taxonomy?
• The classification scheme is meant to encompass
  all of NASA web content (NASA web space)
  including internal as well as external material.
  It is a means for tagging content so it can be
  used and reused in different contexts.
• How to Use the NASA Taxonomy
• This is a generic taxonomy from which
  specializations can be derived for specific
  purposes.
• Not all Facets need to be used in each instance.
• A facet is repeatable.
• The taxonomy is modular and dynamic.

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Taxonomy and Navigation

• How does the NASA Taxonomy relate to site maps?
• Three specializations (or mappings) to the NASA
  Taxonomy have been completed.
• OneNASA Topics (derived from initial draft of the
  One NASA topic breakdown),
• Inside JPL Topics (derived from the JPL intranet
  portal), and
• Inside NASA Topics (proposed as a model for the
  NASA intranet portal, and based heavily on the
  JPL structure).

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NASA Taxonomy Top Level

• Information
• Audiences
• Organizations
• Missions and Projects
• Industries
• Locations
• Functions
• Disciplines
• Chronology
• http//eis.jpl.nasa.gov/jedutra/NASA_Taxonomy_ver
  3/Index.htm

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NASA Taxonomy detail

• . Disciplines
• . . Science
• . . . Aeronautics
• . . . Computer Sciences
• . . . Engineering
• . . . Life Sciences
• . . . Mathematics
• . . . Natural Sciences
• . . . Space Sciences
• . . Social Sciences
• . . . Behavioral Sciences
• . . . Business
• . . . Communications
• . . . Economics
• . . . Education
• . . . Human factors
• . . . Industrial relations
• . . . Information Science

• . Disciplines
• . . Science
• . . . Aeronautics
• . . . Computer Sciences
• . . . . Hardware
• . . . . Computer systems organization
• . . . . Software
• . . . . Data
• . . . . Theory of computation
• . . . . Mathematics of computing
• . . . . Information systems
• . . . . Computing methodologies
• . . . . Computing applications
• . . . . Computing milieu
• . . . Engineering
• . . . . Aerospace engineering
• . . . . Electrical engineering
• . . . . Mechanical engineering
• . . . . Bioengineering

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Taxonomy and XML

• Taxonomy is designed to support a namespace, and
  handles for each concept in it.
• Relationships between concepts are specified by
  using namespace handle combinations.
• ltSVTerm UID"NASA1033079039069842"gt
• ltlabel xmllang"en"gtPurposeslt/labelgt
• ltdefinition xmllang"en"gtThe purpose of
  classifying this learning object. LOM IEEE
  1484.12.1- 2002lt/definitiongt
• ltparent UREF"NASA1031090120256850"/gt
• ltchild UREF"NASA1033079070955810"/gt
• ltchild UREF"NASA1033079087128921"/gt
• lt/SVTermgt

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Taxonomy and XML (2)

• NASA Taxonomy provides controlled vocabularies
  used to populate elements of more complex
  metadata schema such as the Dublin Core
  (www.dublincore.org)
• The taxonomy facets map to these schema elements.

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NASA Taxonomy Dublin Core Map (Draft)
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Encoding Metadata Using NASA Taxonomy and Dublin
Core
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Next Steps in Development
Test and validate NASA taxonomy
Phase 3
Phase 2

• Application
• Demonstrate use

• Alpha taxonomy
• Draft outline
• Elicit comments
• Revise

• Beta taxonomy
• Fill in hierarchies
• Elicit comments
• Revise

in one or more targeted production portals
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Project OutcomesNASA Taxonomy Benefits

• at the NASA Level
• Metadata specification for all NASA content
  publishers
• Development of XML schema in accordance with DISA
  Registry (reuse where appropriate)
• Enhancement of Agency Web publishing processes
• Integration with OneNASA portal content
  management system for
• Reduced publishing cycles
• Coordinated message themes by the Agency
• Better quality of Web materials
• Integration with NASA Search Engine, Web Site
  Registration System
• Application in many technical areas, including
  engineering and science disciplines (STEP and
  science data dictionaries)

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Project OutcomesNASA Taxonomy Benefits

• at the Federal Level
• NASA taxonomy development leadership role in
  accordance with e-Gov Act of 2002
• Integration with FEA at the DRM level
• Increased interoperability with other federal
  agencies through common data models and standards
  
• Better interoperability with industry partners
  for increased speed of mission development
• Enhanced results in First Gov search engine
• Readiness to actively participate in E-Gov
  initiatives

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E-Government Applications
The Federal Enterprise Architecture is a
business-focused framework for cross-agency,
Government-wide improvement
The Federal Enterprise Architecture (FEA) is
providing OMB and Federal agencies with a new way
of describing, analyzing, and improving the
Federal Government and its ability to serve the
citizen The FEA will eliminate the
organizational obstacles that have historically
hindered improvement without forcing
reorganization The FEA is a business-focused
approach and is not just for IT The FEA provides
a common framework for improving a variety of key
areas
Citizen Centered
Business Line Focus

• Budget allocation
• Horizontal and vertical information sharing
• Performance measurement and budget/performance
  integration
• Component Based Architecture

• Cross-agency collaboration
• Improved service to the citizen
• e-Government
• Process integration
• Call center convergence
• and more

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NASA Taxonomy and the Federal Enterprise
Architecture Model
The taxonomy addresses the Data Reference
Model Layer and enables standardization and
mediation
Federal Enterprise Architecture (FEA) by
permission of Bob Haycock, OMB
Performance Reference Model (PRM)

• Government-wide Performance Measures Outcomes
• Line of Business-Specific Performance Measures
  Outcomes

Business Reference Model (BRM)

• Lines of Business
• Agencies, Customers, Partners

Business-Driven Approach
XML and Web Services
Service Component Reference Model (SRM)

• Service Layers, Service Types
• Components, Access and Delivery Channels

Data Reference Model (DRM)

• Business-focused data standardization
• Cross-Agency Information exchanges

Technical Reference Model (TRM)

• Service Component Interfaces, Interoperability
• Technologies, Recommendations