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Metrics for Semantic Social Networks

1

Imran Mir, 2Amjad Farooq, 2Amna Khan

Abstract Measurement is the process which provides us quantitative facts where as metrics are used for measurement by representing quantities and qualities quantitatively. Developing metrics for ontologies facilitates in making managerial decision while developing semantic web applications. Social information can also be represented in form of ontologies which give birth to Semantic Social Networks (SSN) containing information about several people, their friends, interests, likings and disliking. Metrics can be developed to measure such qualities of semantic social networks, quantitatively. In this paper, we propose metrics for measuring behavior of the members of semantic social network. These metrics may help us for quantitatively showing the properties of members in a fast, cheap, simple, reliable and accurate way. Index Terms Metrics, Semantic Social Network, SSN

1 INTRODUCTION

eople have always been struggling to predict and measure quantities and qualities to take appropriate decisions. If we cannot measure things, you cannot improve them. For making improvements in products you must know them completely and you should be able to describe them quantitatively. Metrics can validate attributes and qualities of some process or product in advance and the results can be helpful though out the development cycle. Well defined bunch of metrics for all phases of development cycle can bring awesome improvement while ensuring high quality, timely delivery and maximum customer satisfaction about product. Metrics make decision making easy on quantitatively described quantities and qualities. In semantic web applications, knowledge is represented in form of ontologies. It is a graph in which ideas, concepts and attributes are represented in form of nodes and edges show their relationships [7]. The more concept and attributes, the more complex ontology becomes. Information represented in triplet form can easily be transformed in ontologies. Defining metrics for ontologies help us in making effective decisions about precision, accuracy timely delivery and high quality. Goals are considered as final targets for which metrics can be defined. These targets can be hirarically arranged. Defining metrics for each level provide us different views about the target [1], [12]. Unintentionally, we use thousand of metrics for validating things around us daily. If we meet our old buddy after a long time, we find number of changes in him. Whether our friend has changed or not?? To answer this question our mind makes use of some metrics to measure the common changes in our buddy and these metrics tell us quantitatively that how much our buddy has changed

from his previous state. Ontology consists of concepts and properties being connected through links. These nodes exist in hierarchy. Sometimes axioms are also introduced to represent extra information about concepts and properties [2]. Semantic association between two nodes is actually the link (path) that connects them and show their relationship [3]. Creating a semantic social network means representing social network information in ontological form containing information about people, their likings, disliking, behaviors and interest factors where as metrics can be developed to measure these attributes of member of semantic social network. So metrics can be defined for semantic social networks for measuring attributes and social properties of SSN and members of SSN. Defining metrics can make us able to take proactive actions for improvements of semantic social networks using quantitative facts. Following are the major goals for defining metrics for measuring liking, disliking and other properties that are associated with the members of semantic social network. to help in measuring social attributes to help in introducing new features to help in eliminating existing rustic features that are no longer used by semantic social network members to help in taking proactive actions

Story should not end after representing social information semantically, using ontologies. There must be some useful ways/means for getting network extracts for taking valuable decision and steps for improvement. The more we define qualities and quantities quantitatively the more helpful it becomes to know the system in depth and take proactive actions accordingly. Currently, semantic social 1Imran Mir: Computer Science and Engineering Department, University of networks lack information being represented quantitaEngineering & Technology Lahore. tively and this paper proposes metrics for quantitatively 2Amjad Farooq: Computer Science and Engineering Department, Universimeasuring the attributes of the members of semantic soty of Engineering & Technology Lahore. 2Amna Khan: Computer Science and Engineering Department, University cial networks.
of Engineering & Technology Lahore.

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2 RELATED WORK
Social networks are those networks which are based on the relationships among people [7], [8], [9]. Members of social network are connected with each other in different relations. Semantically representing social information can lead us to a platform where we are able to semantically query all the information available about the members of semantic social networks. The importance of semantically representing information is clear from Neumanns statement where he says that there are number of fragmented pieces of social information available on all over the internet and if we able to represent it semantically then it can lead us to an improved form of data access [6]. Previously there were no semantic social networks and people were not socially connected in a semantic way. Semantic social networks filled the gap and they are growing, as Neumann says that Semantic Social Network will grow like living organism in future [6], [10], [11]. Ontologies are to be used for representing data semantically. Graphically ontologies are represented using graphs which are considered as an abstract technique for modeling data. This technique can be used to represent the entities, their relations and behaviors. Robert provides some metrics for semantic social networks [4] where information has been represented in form of ontologies. His work is foundation for defining further metrics. He defines density of SSN as follows: Mathematically, Density = #of edges #of possible edges (1)

PROPOSED TECHNIQUE

Proposed work contains metrics for measuring social attributes of the members of Semantic Social Network. These metrics provide foundation for defining further metrics for measuring social attributes. Following is the list of proposed metrics: Activity Factor Caclculation Metric Interest Factor Calculation Metric

3.1 Activity Factor Calculation Metric

This metric provides quantitative facts about the jobs/tasks being performed by the member of semantic social network. Greater the number of jobs performed by a member, greater is the degree of activity. This metric can help in identifying persons with low, moderate and high activity factor in their social network. Dividing people into low, moderate and high activity levels can help in introducing different features targeting their level. Persons with low activity can be attracted by introducing features of their interest. Advantages: Persons with low, moderate and high activity factor can be identified easily. Persons with low activity factor can be attracted by introducing new features related to their domains of interest. (Interest factor can be calculated using Interest Factor Calculation Metric) It can help in identifying bulk activities caused by automated scripts. It can help in making the social network stable. Activity factor tells that how much a member is active in his social circle and this activity is proportional to the jobs he performs. Mathematically, Activity Jobs Performed (3)

Equation (1) states that density of a semantic social network is the ratio of number of edges of a node to the number of possible edges of a node. Moving further, Robert also proposed metric for measuring popularity of a node in Semantic Social Network. According to him popularity of a node is approximately equal to number of edge of that node [4]: Mathematically, Popularity ~ #of edges per node . (2) From equation (2) we can conclude that popularity of a person can be calculated by analyzing the edges of a node. Greater the number of edges, greater is the popularity of that node. Defining metrics for some domain is complete methodologies in which you are suppose to have deep knowledge of that domain, metrics being proposed by other people in that domain (work done by other people in same field) and specially the areas which lack metrics. Targeting specific domain with deep knowledge of existing work can make us able to define metrics successfully.

Equation (3) states that activeness is proportional to the number of jobs being performed by a member. In a semantic social network, a member can perform number of tasks. These tasks may include followings Sharing information or media with others Commenting on shared stuff Liking/disliking the posts by other members Chatting with friends Emailing friends Playing online games etc

Quantitatively representing the activity factor can help in identifying the jobs being performed and the frequency of their occurrences.

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3.2 Interest Factor Calculation Metric

This Metric can be used for finding the interests of a person. It analyzes the activities and the time being spent by the member of semantic social network in performing a particular activity. The activity which is frequently performed and which engages the member for maximum time can help in finding his interest. If a member of SSN spends most of his time in playing games online and he performs this activity frequently then playing games can be considered as his major interest. Finding Interest of a member of SSN can help in targeting special features that fit his interests and secondly the persons with low activity factor can be attracted by introducing features related to their interests. Mathematically,

Interest factor of an SSN member depends on followings: Frequency of activity being performed Active time spent in performing that activity

There are some activities in semantic social networks which require more time for completion as compared to others. For example writing email is a relatively big task as compared to giving a comment on some post. So calculating interest factor only on number of jobs being performed is not sufficient because a person giving five (5) comments will have more activity factor as compared to the one who wrote email in 10 minutes. That is why frequency of activities being performed and active time spent are two inter-related concepts and are collectively used to find the interest factor of a member of SSN. Below figure explains how an activity is to be selected with maximum interest factor because of its frequency of occurrence and the time for which it engages the person:

Figure 1: Favorite Activity Selection Flow T1 (A1): Time spent in performing Activity 1 T2 (A2): Time spent in performing Activity 2 : Sum of weighted ratio of activity and weighted ratio of time for activity 1 : Sum of weighted ratio of activity and weighted ratio of time for activity 2 Advantages: It helps in finding favorite activities of SSN members which can make decision authorities to introduce new interesting features of same category. It helps in finding rustic activities which are no longer used by the members of SSN. Such rustic activities can be removed from SSN making a vacant room for new activities. Persons with low activity factor can be attracted by introducing and suggesting features of their interests. Friends usually own same interests so people of same interest, located in same locality, can be suggested for friendship. Updated news about the interested activities can be provided to the members of SSN.

Above mentioned formula states that interest factor is actually the sum of weighted ratio of activities and weighted ratio of time spent. Interest is calculated by analyzing the activity, a person performs frequently and that engages the person most of the time. Steps for Calculating Interest Factor Calculate total time spent for each activity Calculate Number of times each activity is performed Calculate weighted ratio of activities which is equal to number of times a particular activity performed divided by total activities performed. Calculate weighted ratio of time against each activity which is equal to time spent in performing an activity divided by total active time spent. Calculate sum of weighted ratio of activities and weighted ratio of time spent. Activity with largest resultant value is the one which is performed most frequently and that engages the person for most of the time.

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CASE STUDIES

This section contains case studies of the metrics mentioned above to measure the social attributes of the members of semantic social network. Developed application validates the results of the proposed metrics.

3.1 Activity Factor Calculation Metric

Activity metric uses number of tasks, being performed, to calculate the activity of a member of SSN. It provides the figures showing the activeness of a member. Greater the jobs performed, greater is the activity factor. In a semantic social network there can be number of activities which a person can perform. It may include chatting, emailing, commenting, playing online games with friends etc. Activity Table

Seed value is an adjustable parameter which we can set according to the size of the activities. It contains the number of tasks to be performed per day to fall in high activity category. If there are small activities in SSN then Seed value must be adjusted big as members will be required to perform more activities to fall in high activity category. If SSN contains big activities then Seed is to be adjusted small because each activity will take considerable time to be performed and thus member will be required to perform less activities to fall in high activity factor. Example If we want to divide members of SSN into categories depending upon their activities of 12 days and we consider 5 activities per day as high activity ratio so categorization formula will be

Figure 2: Activity Table of Members of Semantic Social Network

Activity table shows the jobs performed by the members of SSN in a particular time period. As activity factor is equal to number of jobs performed so below table shows the activity factor of the members of SSN Name Activity Factor Kate 49 Edward 70 John 50 Philips 10 Newton 80 Jason 5 Figure 3: Activity Factors of SSN Members From above table it is clear that Newton has the maximum activity factor by performing 80 jobs/tasks in a particular time period. Categorization People can be divided into categories depending upon their activity factor. Separate strategies can be adopted for each category in order to attract people. Following are the main categories for dividing people depending on their activity factor:

High Activity = Number of days * Seed High Activity = 12 * 5 High Activity = 60 Moderate Activity = More than 50% of High Activity Low Activity = Less than 50% of High Activity

Above mentioned formulas state that people with more than 60 activities in 12 days will fall in high activity category. People with more than 30 activities will fall in moderate category where as remaining people fall in Low Activity category.

Following is the categorization of SSN members depending upon their activity shown in Activity Table while considering 60 as high activity value:

High Activity Category (Activity Factor > 60) Edward Newton

Moderate Activity Category (Activity Factor > 30) Kate John

Low Activity Category (Activity Factor < 30) Philips Jason

Low Activity Category Moderate Activity Category High Activity Category

Sample Activities

Formula for diving people in categories is as follows High Activity = Number of days * Seed . (7) Seed is the number of activities to be performed per day, in order to fall in high activity category

Figure 4: Chat Activity Figure 5: Email Activity

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3.2 Interest Factor Calculation Metric

Interest factor calculation metric can help in identifying the interest of a member of SSN. It depends on number of times an activity is performed and time spent in performing that activity. So it concludes that the activity a member performs frequently and that engages the member for the maximum time can reflect the interest of a member of SSN.

Interest factor is the sum of weighted ratio of activities and weighted ratio of time spent so putting values in equation (6) for finding Edwards interest in games Interest Factor = (0.0714285 + 0.454545 ) * 100 Edwards interest factor in Games = 52.5973 % Similarly Edwards Interest in comments can be measured by directly putting values in equation (6) = ( ( 30/35 * 0.50) + ( 2/22 * 0.50 ) * 100 ) Edwards Interest factor against Comments = 47.3954 % As Edward performed only two activities so from above calculations we can conclude that Edward has more interest towards playing games as compared to making comments.

Output of Interest factor calculation metric is a numeric value representing the interest of member of SSN toward some activity. The activity with maximum interest factor is declared as favorite activity that a person performs most of the time (frequently). Below table shows the activities of Edward and John in their social circle in some particular time. Activity Table

Figure 6: Activity Table of Members of Semantic Social Network Edwards Interest Factor towards Games

According to equation (6) interest factor is actually the sum of weighted ratio of activities and weighted ratio of time spent. So in first step we calculate weighted ratio of games, Edward played Number of times Edward played games = 5 Total number of activities performed = 35
(Total) 35 = 5 (Games) + 0 (Emails) + 30 (Comments)

Similarly Interest factor can be calculated for John by putting his figures into activity calculation formula. Example Below diagram shows graphically the selection procedure of the most interested activity of a person who performs 3 activities of playing games in 15 minutes and 2 activities of watching movie clips in 10 minutes:

Putting vales in equation (4) Weighted Ratio of = ( 5/35 ) * 0.50 Activities

Weighted Ratio of = 0.0714285 Activities In second step we calculate weighted ratio of time spent

Time spent in playing games = 20 Total active time spent = 22

(Total) 22 = 20 (Games) + 0 (Emails) + 2 (Comments)

Figure 7: Favorite Activity Selection Flow - Example From above fig we can conclude that Game playing is the activity which was performed more frequently and engaged the person for most of the time so it can be declared as most interested activity for that member, in SSN. Both the ratios in activity calculation formula are equally important thats why they have been given half-half weightage.

Putting values in equation (5) for calculating weighted ratio of time spent in playing games, we get Weighted Ratio of = ( 20/22 ) * 0.50 Time Spent Weighted Ratio of = 0.45454545 Time Spent

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5. CONCLUSION AND FUTURE WORK

Defining metrics for semantic social networks can help in identifying interests, activities, reputation, behaviors and other factors which can provide quantitative facts to be used for taking proactive decisions for the betterment of SSN. These metrics not only help in identifying the famous domains (people are mostly interested in) but these metrics also help in identifying the rustic activities which are no longer used by the members of SSN and must be eliminated to make vacant rooms for new activities. This paper opens a horizon and provides a platform by defining basic social network metrics which can be used for

defining further metrics about behaviors and likings of members of semantic social networks. The more we define metrics, the more quantitatively we define data that leads to taking better actions for the members of SSN and SSN itself.

ACKNOWLEDGMENT
This research work has been supported by the Higher Education Commission of Pakistan, and the University of Engineering and Technology, Lahore.

AUTHORS
Imran Mir is a student of MS in department of Computer Science and Engineering, UET, Lahore. He is currently doing job in Systems Limited (Software House) as a Senior Software Developer. His major interests include Computer Programming, Software Engineering, Semantic Web and Intelligent Information Retrieval Systems. Amna Khan is currently doing Masters in Computer Sciences from the University of Engineering and Technology, Lahore, Pakistan. She is currently employed as a Lecturer in Department of Computer Sciences, Sharif College of Engineering and Technology. Current Research Interests includes Semantic Web Applications, Software Engineering and Human Computer Interaction. Dr. Amjad Farooq is currently doing job as Professor in University of Engineering and Technology Lahore. His interests include Computer Programming, Semantic Web and Databases.

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