Streamlining Knowledge Graph Construction with a fa\c{c}ade: The SPARQL Anything project

TL;DR

This paper introduces SPARQL Anything, a system that simplifies knowledge graph construction by enabling flexible querying of diverse data formats and resources through a unified SPARQL-based framework, supported by a facade design.

Contribution

It presents the design and architecture of SPARQL Anything, a novel system that overcomes format limitations and enhances data integration for knowledge engineers.

Findings

Supports a wide range of file formats including Markdown, YAML, DOCx, Bibtex

Enables querying Web APIs with high flexibility and parametrized queries

Validated through community surveys and industry field reports

Abstract

What should a data integration framework for knowledge engineers look like? Recent research on Knowledge Graph construction proposes the design of a fa\c{c}ade, a notion borrowed from object-oriented software engineering. This idea is applied to SPARQL Anything, a system that allows querying heterogeneous resources as-if they were in RDF, in plain SPARQL 1.1, by overloading the SERVICE clause. SPARQL Anything supports a wide variety of file formats, from popular ones (CSV, JSON, XML, Spreadsheets) to others that are not supported by alternative solutions (Markdown, YAML, DOCx, Bibtex). Features include querying Web APIs with high flexibility, parametrised queries, and chaining multiple transformations into complex pipelines. In this paper, we describe the design rationale and software architecture of the SPARQL Anything system. We provide references to an extensive set of reusable, real-world scenarios from various application domains. We report on the value-to-users of the founding assumptions of its design, compared to alternative solutions through a community survey and a field report from the industry.