Introduction to the Semantic Web Technologies -- Semantic Web Architecture -- Semantic Annotations and Retrieval: Manual, Semi-automatic and Automatic Generation -- Semantic Annotation and Retrieval: RDF -- Semantic Annotation and Retrieval: Web of Hypertext: RDFa and Microformats -- Semantic Annotation and Retrieval: Web of Data -- Storing the Semantic Web: Repositories -- Querying the Semantic Web: SPARQL -- Knowledge Representation and Reasoning on the Semantic Web: OWL -- Knowledge Representation and Reasoning on the Semantic Web: RIF -- Knowledge Representation and Reasoning on the Semantic Web: Web-scale Reasoning -- Social Semantic Web -- Ontologies and the Semantic Web -- Future Trends -- Semantic Technology Adoption: A Business Perspective -- Semantic Web Search Engines -- eScience -- Knowledge Management in Large Organizations -- eBusiness -- eGovernment -- Multimedia, Broadcasting and eCulture -- Semantic Web Services -- Glossary; Index.

After years of mostly theoretical research, Semantic Web Technologies are now reaching out into application areas like bioinformatics, eCommerce, eGovernment, or Social Webs. Applications like genomic ontologies, semantic web services, automated catalogue alignment, ontology matching, or blogs and social networks are constantly increasing, often driven or at least backed up by companies like Google, Amazon, YouTube, Facebook, LinkedIn and others. The need to leverage the potential of combining information in a meaningful way in order to be able to benefit from the Web will create further demand for and interest in Semantic Web research. This movement, based on the growing maturity of related research results, necessitates a reliable reference source from which beginners to the field can draw a first basic knowledge of the main underlying technologies as well as state-of-the-art application areas. This handbook, put together by three leading authorities in the field, and supported by an advisory board of highly reputed researchers, fulfils exactly this need. It is the first dedicated reference work in this field, collecting contributions about both the technical foundations of the Semantic Web as well as their main usage in other scientific fields like life sciences, engineering, business, or education.