Annotea is a W3C
project based on RDF and a
annotation schema
.
From Official Web Site:
"Annotea is part of the Semantic Web efforts. It provides a RDF metadata
based extendible framework for rich communication about Web pages while
offering a simple annotation and bookmark user interface. The annotation
metadata can be stored locally or in one or more annotation servers and
presented to the user by a client capable of understanding this metadata
and capable of interacting with an annotation server with the HTTP
service protocol."
Why another annotea server?
The principal differences between the W3 implementation of the
annotea server and
mine
are:
language: the W3 staff implemented the annotea server in
perl. I used C.
Programmers like unuseful discussions like:
Perl VS C.
modular approach: the W3 staff used interdependent perl modules.
I only used
libnxml to parse the XML documents and i used only the basic
libraries for everything else. I obtained a high portable and easy
to manage piece of software.
storage system: the W3 staff used a
MySQL database to store data.
I prefered to use files and directories on filesystem. It's not a
good idea to save on a database text document that could be very
longs.
accessibility: It exists a library (libannotea) that let possibles
software clients to connect to the server and insert, modify and
delete annotations.
Libannotea is also a PHP
extension that let you do the same operations to scripts or dynamic
web pages. In the annotea server's sources you'll find also a web
interface that, using the php libannotea, let you consult a server.
debug: my annotea server massively use the stderr and so the
apache's log files. Depending on the configuration, you can follow
the behaviour of the software with the degree of details you want.
But.... what pushed me creating this server is the research spirit, the
hacking. The study of semantic web made me know new languges, new
theories. All that, with the proverbial "Put your hands on" bring me to
this first result.