Version 5: Multi-lingual start and extended cross-referencing among semantic resources
From the outset in 2011, CaLAThe was rendered in the
English language. Version 5 starts a multi-lingual itinerary by adding
terms (SKOS: prefLabel) in Danish and Turkish, the native language of
the authors. Other languages and provision of definitions in national
languages may follow, supporting among others (university) education. -
The
engagement with national language terminology revealed different
semantic sources, including 1. the dictionaries and lexica of national
associations/
societies and publishers, 2. the terms and definitions of laws and
ordinances, etc, and 3. data models prepared in the context of
e-government. The recording of and reference to these resources is an
open issue.
CaLAThe started out as a concept structure with relatively sparse
concept definitions. Definitions have been added with every new
version. For version 5, the concepts of the Land concept collection
were reviewed and definitions supplemented. The European Union's EuroVoc was included in this process. Especially, narrowers of EuroVoc's Law were
compared with CaLAThe concepts, definitions reviewed and often
references to EuroVoc concepts were recorded as Exact match or Close
match in CaLAThe. Already in 2019, CaLAThe was available through The
Basic Register of Thesauri, Ontologies & Classifications (BARTOC) and the Definitions Server of the OGC. The cross-referencing process continued during 2020, with CaLAThe being linked with the LandVoc thesaurus and FAO's AGROVOC.
Like
other semantic resources, CaLAThe has to navigate within different
families of legal systems. This became again an issue when relating the
English with the Danish and Turkish legal terms. The notion of 'Law of
obligation' was introduced, preferred relative to a ius in rem/ ius in
personam distinction. In this context, Legal personality was also
introduced. The
notion of Real property was so far not included in CaLAThe, following
the assessment stated p. 9 in the report Real Property Law and Procedure in the European Union, 2005,
mentioned in Version 3 intro. The fact, that the term is widely used in
the surveying commmunity, motivated us to replace prefLabel
PropertyUnit with prefLabel Real property, and keep PropertyUnit as
altLabel. - Likewise to the legal family issue, the structuring
of governmental agencies recording land information are complex. To
better address this complexity, version 5 introduces Registry, defined
as 1. Official
records of people or things relating to a business or other activity 2.
Organization or place that keeps official records.
CaLAThe now comprises about 250
terms. In addition, the code list names and values, mentioned in the introduction to version 4, amounts to about 110.
Acknowledgements
Laura Meggiolaro and Carlos Tejo Alonso, Land Portal Foundation, facilitated the LandVoc linking
Jan Hjelmager, The Danish Agency for Data Supply and Efficiency, commented on the Danish terms.