The Python Podcast.__init__ - Build Your Own Knowledge Graph

Aug 05 2019 48 mins 2

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Summary

Computers are excellent at following detailed instructions, but they have no capacity for understanding the information that they work with. Knowledge graphs are a way to approximate that capability by building connections between elements of data that allow us to discover new connections among disparate information sources that were previously uknown. In our day-to-day work we encounter many instances of knowledge graphs, but building them has long been a difficult endeavor. In order to make this technology more accessible Tom Grek built Zincbase. In this episode he explains his motivations for starting the project, how he uses it in his daily work, and how you can use it to create your own knowledge engine and begin discovering new insights of your own.

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Your host as usual is Tobias Macey and today I’m interviewing Tom Grek about knowledge graphs, when they’re useful, and his project Zincbase that makes them easier to build

Interview

Introductions

How did you get introduced to Python?

Can you start by explaining what a knowledge graph is and some of the ways that they are used?
- How did you first get involved in the space of knowledge graphs?

You have built the Zincbase project for building and querying knowledge graphs. What was your motivation for creating this project and what are some of the other tools that are available to perform similar tasks?

Can you describe how Zincbase is implemented and some of the ways that it has evolved since you first began working on it?
- What are some of the assumptions that you had at the outset of the project which have been challenged or updated in the process of working on and with it?

What are some of the common challenges when building or using knowledge graphs?

How has the domain of knowledge graphs changed in recent years as new approaches to entity resolution and data processing have been introduced?

Can you talk through a use case and workflow for using Zincbase to design and populate a knowledge graph?

What are some of the ways that you are using Zincbase in your own projects?

What have you found to be the most challenging/interesting/unexpected lessons that you have learned in the process of building and maintaining Zincbase?