“Graphs in Libraries: A Primer”
by James E. Powell, Daniel Alcazar, Matthew Hopkins, Robert Olendorf, Tamara M. McMahon, Amber Wu, Linn Collins
From the Abstract:
Whenever librarians use Semantic Web services and standards for representing data, they also generate graphs, whether they intend to or not. Graphs are a new data model for libraries and librarians, and present new opportunities for library services. In this paper, we introduce graph theory and explore its real and potential applications in the context of digital libraries. Part I describes basic concepts in graph theory and how graph theory has been applied by information retrieval systems such as Google. Part II discusses practical applications of graph theory in digital library environments. Some of the applications have been prototyped at the Los Alamos National Laboratory Research Library, others have been described in peer-reviewed journals, and still others are speculative in nature. Overall, the paper is intended to serve as a high-level tutorial to graphs in libraries.
The preprint was posted on the Information Technology and Libraries web site.
ITAL is published by the Library Information and Technology Association (LITA)
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