GloSIS: The Global Soil Information System Web Ontology

Submitted by Raúl Palma on 03/19/2025 - 04:06

Tracking #: 3825-5039

Authors: 
Raúl Palma
Bogusz Janiak
Luís M. de Sousa1
Kathi Schleidt
Tomáš Rezník
Fenny van Egmond
Johan Leenaars
Dimitrios Moshou
Abdul Mouazen
Peter Wilson
David Medyckyj-Scott
Alistair Ritchie
Yusuf Yigini
Ronald Vargas

Responsible editor: 
Cogan Shimizu

Submission type: 
Full Paper
Abstract: 
Established in 2012 by members of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), the Global Soil Partnership (GSP) is a global network of stakeholders promoting sound land and soil management practices towards a sustainable world food system. However, soil survey largely remains a local or regional activity, bound to heterogeneous methods and conventions. Recognising the relevance of global and trans-national policies towards sustainable land management practices, the GSP elected data harmonisation and exchange as one of its key lines of action. Building upon international standards and previous work towards a global soil data ontology, an improved domain model was eventually developed within the GSP [54], the basis for a Global Soil Information System (GloSIS). This work also identified the Semantic Web as a possible avenue to operationalise the domain model. This article presents the GloSIS web ontology, an implementation of the GloSIS domain model with the Web Ontology Language (OWL). Thoroughly employing a host of SemanticWeb standards (SOSA, SKOS, GeoSPARQL, QUDT), GloSIS lays out not only a soil data ontology but also an extensive set of ready-to-use code-lists for soil description and physio-chemical analysis. Various examples are provided on the provision and use of GloSIS-compliant linked data, showcasing the contribution of this ontology to the discovery, exploration, integration and access of soil data.
Full PDF Version: 
PDF icon swj3825.pdf
Previous Version: 
GloSIS: The Global Soil Information System Web Ontology
Tags: 
Reviewed
Long-term Stable Link to Resources: 
https://w3id.org/glosis/model

Decision/Status: 
Accept

Solicited Reviews:
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Review #1
Anonymous submitted on 27/Mar/2025
Suggestion:
Accept
Review Comment:

This paper has undergone several iterations of revision, and in this round I am mainly reviewing the revisions in response to the requested edits in the previous decision/metareview, as well as the overall impression of the paper.

Overall, the paper now reads well, and does not suffer from severe language issues, and all the required revisions have been implemented. Although, the discussion and motivation of using the SKOS & OWL patter is still quite brief in the paper. The most significant improvement is the documentation of the ontologies, which make them now usable and understandable by others, and the fact that all the links resolve.

In summary, I therefore recommend accepting the paper, but considering to make a few small edits before submitting the final version:

- The two URIs on page 6 that are provided inline in text should be put as footnotes.

- All listings should be referenced in text (e.g. this is not the case for all listings in 3.3.1 and 3.3.2), and I am not sure I get the "dot-notation" used for instance for the concept in Listing 1 so this should be explained.

- I am missing the full specification of the notation of fig 3-4. The arrows seem to mean different things, while in some cases they signify a "triple", e.g. subClassOf, but in other cases they seem to indicate something else - domain and range or other restrictions?

- Formatting of some listings is not very readable, adjust the linebreaks to appear in better positions, and also some seem to contain syntax errors such as missing "."