Semantic Web Service provision: a realistic framework for Bioinformatics programmers

• Published in: Bioinformatics 2007-05, Vol.23 (9), p.1178-1180, Article 1178
• Main Authors: Gordon, Paul M.K., Trinh, Quang, Sensen, Christoph W.
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Bioinformatics; Biological and medical sciences; Computational Biology - methods; Database Management Systems; Databases, Genetic; Fundamental and applied biological sciences. Psychology; General aspects; Information Storage and Retrieval - methods; Internet; Mathematics in biology. Statistical analysis. Models. Metrology. Data processing in biology (general aspects); Natural Language Processing; Programming Languages; Semantics; Software; User-Computer Interface
• ISSN: 1367-4803; 1367-4811; 1460-2059
• DOI: 10.1093/bioinformatics/btm060

Several semantic Web Services clients for Bioinformatics have been released, but to date no support systems for service providers have been described. We have created a framework ('MobyServlet') that very simply allows an existing Java application to conform to the MOBY-S semantic Web Services protocol. Using an existing Java program for codon-pair bias determination as an example, we enumerate the steps required for MOBY-S compliance. With minimal programming effort, such a deployment has the advantages of: (1) wider exposure to the user community by automatic inclusion in all MOBY-S client programs and (2) automatic interoperability with other MOBY-S services for input and output. Complex on-line analysis will become easier for biologists as more developers adopt MOBY-S. Availability: The framework and documentation are freely available from the Java developer's section of http://www.biomoby.org/. Contact: [e-mail]