Java Run-Time Environment (JRE) – JRE version 1.4 or higher
( Java Web Start is Sun’s technology for easy distribution of Java application. It should have been installed when you installed your JRE. If not, please refer to the JRE installation http://java.sun.com/j2se/1.4.2/jre/install.html . )
Option 1: Starting ConceptVista from “Shortcut to ConceptVista”
Option 2: Start ConceptVista using Java Web Start
Two example ontologies are available on the ConceptVista Web Site.
ConceptVista allows you to explore and manage any ontology that is encoded in OWL. If you have your own OWL ontology or you have downloaded our example ontology, you start exploring it with ConceptVista in less than a minute.
If all go well,
ConceptVista will soon show you the self-organizing graph and the tree
view of your ontology.
Presently, ConceptVista visualizes an ontology in two different views, namely, a tree view and a GraphView. By default, the tree view occupies the top left corner of the ConceptVista window and the GraphView takes up two-third of the space on the right side.
The tree view to the left provides a hierarchy
view of concepts and properties. Two different panels are available
under tree view
Class Panel — Display a hierarchy of concepts. A concept
whether it is class or instance of a class can be identified from the
symbol that appears next to a concept. With the square box either “C” –
representing Class, or “I” – representing instance will appear.
Property Panel — Display
properties that relate concepts.
Visibility of each concept can be turned
on/off
by selecting/unselecting the visibility check box located on the
right of the node. The visibility setting
controls whether you can see the node in the GraphView.
Each class or subclass has some descriptive information. You can display this information by double-clicking on the node. A new window will open at the bottom left corner of ConceptVista window. This window contains three tabs. The first tab shows the annotation of the node, the second properties, and the last a Web page describing the node. See example below that shows the result after double-klicking the Deforestation node.
The Graph view is a self-organizing graph view developed by TouchGraph LLC. It represents each class, subclass, or instance as a node of the graph. The relationships between various nodes are represented as edges. The location of these nodes and edges are determined by TouchGraph’s internal layout algorithm. Users can still, however, control some aspects of the layout so as to enhance the readability and comprehensibility of the graph. The following layout properties are what users can set.
Zoom — The slider bar labeled ‘Zoom’ at the top of the TouchGraph view sets the distances between nodes. If you increase the zoom level, nodes will become further apart and vice versa. Additionally, zoom levels below zero will affect the node size. The size and labels of nodes shrink as you lower the zoom level.
Rotate — The ‘Rotate’ slider bar as the name implies rotates the graph around its centroid.
Locality — The ‘Locality’ slider bar controls visibility of nodes connected to a selected center node. You can select a center node by double-clicking on a node in the TouchGraph view or in the tree view. You can think of locality as the number of edges on a path away from the center node. A path with locality of ‘1’ has two nodes and one edge connecting them. A path with locality of ‘2’ has three nodes and two edges connecting them. Therefore as you increase the locality value, the paths away from the center node will become longer. A locality value of ‘0’ shows only the center node.
Visibility — Regardless of the locality setting, you can always display the nodes directly connected to a node. The number on the tiny red tag on the right of a node indicates how many nodes are connected to this node. If you right-click on any node, a pop-up menu will appear. Among the menu items, you will find ‘Expand’ and ‘Hide’. Selecting ‘Expand’ will show the nodes adjacent to this node. Selecting ‘Hide’ will make the node invisible. You can also set the visibility of any node in the tree view. Please read the tree view section above for details.
A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q
New: Create a new ontologyOpen.
Open Existing ontology
Close. Close current ontology
Save: Save current ontology (check known bugs)
Undo: Undo changes (not functioning in this version)
Redo: Redo changes (not functioning in this version)
Copy: Copy class, instance or resources
Cut: cut class, instance or resources
Paste: Paste class, instance or resources
Edit: Edit selected class, instance or resource’s properties
Delete: Delete selected class, instance or resource. Deleting a class does not delete all the instances, but the instances are copied to the root source
Search: Search web (google, amazon, DLESE, or ontology) for the select class, instance or resources
Edit Style: Change the appearance of a node in the graph view. Changing the style of a class changes the style of its subclasses and instances.
Start Animation: continuously changes the appearance of a node in the graph view. Changes in the appearance of a node depend on the dynamic style applied to the node.
Stop Animation: Stop the animation.
Help: Opens the help file
About: About ConceptVista
The current version of ConceptVista does not yet allow customization of the appearance of links/edges.
Two types of node styles are available: static and dynamic. As the names imply, the static style does not change with time, while the dynamic style does. Once you set the static style of a node, it remains constant until you change it again. In case of the dynamic style, instead of setting a particular value, you set a range of values of a visual characteristic of a node. The value of that characteristic will change within the set range over time.
To open the style set-up dialog for both dynamic and static styles, you right-click on the node you what to stylize either in the tree view or the touch graph view. Then you select the menu item ‘Stylize’ from the pop-up menu that appears.
On the style set-up dialog, you have the options to set the following characteristics of a node. As you experiment with different settings, you may preview the node appearance in the preview window at the bottom of the dialog. Press the ‘Click here to preview’ button to refresh the preview image.
Shape — This property sets the shape of the node.
Paint — This property sets how the background color is painted. You may also use image as the background of the node. To do so, select the ‘IMAGE’ item from the ‘Paint’ combo box. This will enable the ‘Image Source’ panel. Then specify the path to the GIF image you would like to use as the node’s background. ConceptVista only supports GIF images.
Label — This property specifies the location of the node’s label. You can place the label at 8 locations around the node: northwest, north, northeast, west, east, southwest, south, and southeast. If you choose the ‘CENTER’ item, the label will be placed inside the node.
Width — This is the width of the node. You can only set this property when you place the node’s label outside.
Height — This is the height of the node. You can only set this property when you place the node’s label outside.
Length — This is the maximum length of the node label in characters. You can only set this property when you place the node’s label inside.
Fill Color — This property sets the background color of the node.
Text Color — This property specifies the color of the label.
Line Color — This property specifies the color of the node boundary.
Line Stroke — This property specifies the line type of the node boundary.
Font Family — This property sets the font family of the label.
Font Style — This property sets the font style of the label to bold, italic, or baseline.
Similar to static style setting, you open the style set-up dialog by right-clicking on the node you want to stylize and select the ‘Stylize’ menu item. Then you select the ‘Dynamic Style’ tab to get to the dynamic style set-up panel. Here, ConceptVista allows you to dynamically change the location of the node, the size of the node, and the background color of the node. This feature is useful for emphasizing certain nodes in the graph. The ensuing subsections will tell you how to set each dynamic style. Note that you can simultaneously change two or even all three properties of the node at the same time.
Rotate — Select the check box labeled ‘ROTATE’ to turn this dynamic style on and right-click on the label to display the style settings. On the pop-up dialog, you can make the node rotate around an arbitrary point or spiral in and out. Select the radio button associated with the rotating style you want. For simple rotation, you can adjust the rotating radius using the top slider. For spiral rotation, you can specify the minimum radius and the maximum radius using the two knobs on the bottom slider.
Swell — Select the check box labeled ‘SWELL’ to turn this dynamic style on and right-click on the label to display the style settings. This dynamic style makes the node swell up and shrink back. You can set minimum size and maximum size of the node using the two knobs on the slider.
Change Color — Select the check box labeled ‘CHANGE COLOR’ to turn this dynamic style on and right-click on the label to display the style settings. This dynamic style changes the background color of the node continuously. The background color of the node is a combination of red, green, and blue (RGB color model). On the pop-up dialog, you can set the ranges of red, green, and blue values that the style will use to dynamically generate a new color.
You can export the static style of one ontology and use it to another ontology. Likewise, you can import a style created for another ontology and use it for your ontology.
Importing Style — Right-click on any node in the tree view and select ‘Importing Style’ from the pop-up menu that appears. This will open the import dialog. Browse to the style file (*.sld) that you want to import, select it, and press the ‘Open’ button.
Exporting Style — Right-click on any node in the tree view and select ‘Exporting Style’ from the pop-up menu that appears. This will open the export dialog. Browse to the location where you want to save the style file. Type the file name you want in the ‘File Name’ text field. Make sure that you add ‘.sld’ at the end of the file name. Then press the ‘Save’ button.
Case I: Create a new Class under root node
Case II: Create a new sub class
Case I: Create a new sub class
Case II: Create a new Sibling Class