“The Cube is, at the same time, a symbol of simplicity and complexity.” – Ernő Rubik

Taxonomists and ontologists–sometimes separate but more often one and the same role I’ll simply call a “taxonomist”–are frequently underappreciated for their work in modeling and representing complex domains. Taxonomists do not simply suggest term forms and put them in a list; they research and consider each concept, carefully map out its relationships to other concepts, and consider how new additions and changes impact the overall semantic model. The nature of taxonomy work is often misunderstood, or, worse, trivialized as work that anyone in the organization might perform. Several expert taxonomists discussed this topic as a pain point in communicating the value of taxonomy at the Henry Stewart Semantic Data 2024 Conference in New York this week.

Taxonomies and ontologies need to be clear, transparent, and wholly visible and available where appropriate. Serving different use cases drives user experience decisions which lean toward simplifying the display of complex semantic models so users can more easily understand and use them. While hiding complexity is a service for end users, it can communicate the result of taxonomy work as simplified dropdown lists, shallow hierarchical structures, or simple concept values without additional properties and relationships. The complexity of semantic models, including the taxonomist’s work in building them, can be hidden and thus misunderstood.

Hidden Work

Semantic models are frequently hidden from users due to their complexity and necessarily strict governance models. The overall semantic structure, potentially composed of many taxonomies connected by robust ontologies, is not always available for the end user to view as a whole or to interact with directly. Hiding the complexity of semantic models can simplify user experiences, but they can also present fractured, contextless concept values. Worse, the art and science of semantic modeling conducted by highly skilled and knowledgeable taxonomists is also hidden…or at least potentially misrepresented.

The implications of this hidden work are manyfold. Because the skilled work of taxonomists is simplified, so too does the portrayal of semantic work seem simple. The result is inexperienced employees taking on taxonomy and ontology modeling tasks, potentially in parallel to ongoing enterprise taxonomy efforts. The fragmentation of taxonomy work in turn impacts the success of the overall taxonomy program as an enterprise strategy.

Additionally, the value of taxonomy work in supporting a variety of use cases is also undercut. Taxonomy is reduced to simple hierarchies to use in navigation or flat lists used in content tagging. The true value of complex, interrelated concepts with additional property metadata is lost. End users, or potential end users, don’t know the art of the possible or even what to ask for from enterprise taxonomists.

Exposing Semantic Models in the UI

Systems consuming taxonomy values are an abstracted layer, presenting concepts in navigational structures, as typeahead values in search boxes, or as limited flat lists for tagging content or assets. Because of this, the additional value of ontological relationships and property metadata is stripped away. Of course, designing user experiences to meet the use case and deciding when it is appropriate to display taxonomy values, how many, what type, and what is possible are all aimed at organizational efficiency and clarity. Sometimes too much is just too much.

However, consideration is not always given to what else from a semantic model may be displayed, and in what way, so that users get more contextual value from taxonomy concepts shown out of context. How much information associated to a taxonomy concept should be exposed and in what context? Concept definitions or synonyms might be valuable to expose to end users so they understand the label and what else it may represent. These could be displayed in a hover menu so they are available but unobtrusive.

Similarly, taxonomies need not always be displayed as flat lists or hierarchies. Taxonomies are natural candidates for graphical visualizations to display interconnected values and associated metadata. Many existing taxonomy and ontology tools include APIs or widgets meant to display taxonomies in just this way external to the tool. Publicly available visualization libraries can be used in custom, in-house built UIs to display and navigate graphs. A graphical user experience can display the complexity of semantic models, including hierarchical and associative relationships, while easing their presentation and navigation.

Taxonomies and ontologies are foundational components in the training and refining of machine learning models, including their use as a source for tagging machine learning training sets and as institutional reference for large language models. Graphical displays have the benefit of exposing the full scope of semantic models for more complex use cases like serving data to machine learning models. 

Another way to expose the full scope of semantic models is to provide partners with read-only access to taxonomy and ontology management systems. These tools typically have few editing licenses which should be reserved for members of the taxonomy team to maintain proper model governance. Read access, when available, should be reserved for business partners who understand, or are willing to be trained, how to navigate complicated platforms.

The Benefits

There are several benefits to getting creative about how and what to expose from semantic models.

The main benefit is discrete, visual communication and training of the complexity and possibilities of semantic models. Good UIs don’t simply provide a way of interacting with machines, they also educate and train the end user on common principles such as clicking on a button to perform an action, pinching in and out to view content, and, in this case, how to traverse hierarchies and graphs. From this, end users may come to their own realizations about how semantic models may be used in their projects.

Another benefit is increasing end user awareness and the visible profiles of the taxonomists and taxonomy program. Knowing how information is provided to consuming systems and who is responsible for creating, modeling, and maintaining that information provides a point of contact for end users who can field their questions. Since consumers don’t always know the full range of possible semantic model use cases, they are provided a path to get modeling advice. Taxonomists increase their visibility and can act as internal consultants on a range of organizational projects. In turn, their valuable skills are employed in many areas of information management, improving the overall health of information best practices.

In sum, don’t hide your taxonomists or their work. Get creative about how to expose what they do and the results of their professional skills.