EC-WEB 2014

Automotive ranges as e-commerce dataEC-WEB - Munich - September 2, 2014

François-Paul Servant, François Jurain, Edouard Chevalier{francois-paul.servant,francois.jurain,edouard.chevalier}@renault.com

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Rich data for web marketing is cool,

but how do you publish data about1020 Renault cars*?

*Yes, 100 billions of billions, for sale right now

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01 Publishing descriptions of customizable products is possible

0203

Search Engines can effectively index these data

Extension to Schema.org proposal

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Product ranges in the automotive industry are huge

Body styles x Engines x Gearboxes

x Colorsx Air Conditioning systemsx Radios x Navigation systemsx Electronic Stability System?x ABS?x Sun-roof?x ...

= 1025

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Huge, and complex

Body styles x Engines x Gearboxes

x Colorsx Air Conditioning systemsx Radios x Navigation systemsx Electronic Stability System?x ABS?x Sun-roof?x ...

= 1025

Constraints invalidate some combination of features : technical, industrial and legal constraints, marketing policy

=1020- "Unglazed rear doors exclude rear wipers"- "Rear electric windows imply front electric windows"- ...

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Huge, and complex

Body styles x Engines x Gearboxes

x Colorsx Air Conditioning systemsx Radios x Navigation systemsx Electronic Stability System?x ABS?x Sun-roof?x ...

= 1025

Every combination of features is not possible : technical, industrial and legal constraints, marketing policy

=1020- "Unglazed rear doors exclude rear wipers"- "Rear electric windows imply front electric windows"- ...

1 chance upon 100,000 to get an existing car,

if you pick at random from the available specificationswithout taking the constraints into account.

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Automotive ranges Cannot be enumerated: defined "in intention"

A set of Variables and Constraints between their values ("specifications"):

a "Constraint Satisfaction Problem" (CSP)

Computationally hard!

Reasoning software required to handle them

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How to publish such descriptions? The CSP can be represented using Semantic Web languages

But publishing such data on the web would be too demanding of the clients

Reasoning better hosted on the server

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Configurators:an effective way of presenting a range to human users

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Configurators:interactive definition of a car, one choice after the other

Previous selections Possible choices

Previous selections identify a configuration

Possible choices link to to refined configurations

at each step: list of possible choices, given the choices made so far

The configuration process

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Configuration as Linked Data Each Configuration is identified by a URI

Configuration = "Partially Defined Product" = state of the configuration process

Configuration Process = Traversal of a graph of linked Configurations

= Linked Data!

Reasoning handled by the server, complexity hidden from the client

Configuration ontology ("COLD")

http://purl.org/configurationontology

3 main classes: Specification, Configuration and ConfigurationLink

5 properties: chosenSpec, impliedSpec, possible, alternative, impossible

the different kinds of relations between a Configuration and a Specification

A generic, domain independent ontology

not limited to the automotive industry

doesn't depend on the vocabulary used for the specifications

most online configurator applications could use it

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Entry point: the list of models

<http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/docs#this> a cold:Configuration ; cold:possible [ a cold:ConfigurationLink ; rdfs:label "Laguna Hatchback 2011"@en ; cold:linkedConf <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/c/BAv/AAI#this> ; cold:specToBeAdded <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/LA3#this> ] ; cold:possible [ a cold:ConfigurationLink ; rdfs:label "Mégane Sport Tourer"@en ; cold:linkedConf <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/c/BACp/AAI#this> ; cold:specToBeAdded <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BACp/M3K#this> ] ; ...

Renault range (UK)

Possible choices:the list of models

Link to Laguna Hatchback...

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The "Laguna Hatchback" configuration

<http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/c/BAv/AAI#this> a cold:Configuration ; cold:chosenSpec <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/LA3#this> ; cold:possible [ a cold:ConfigurationLink ; cold:linkedConf <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/c/BAv/AAMDg#this> ; cold:specToBeAdded <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/PT1633_automatic_gearbox#this> ] ; cold:possible [ a cold:ConfigurationLink ; ...

<http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/PT1633_automatic_gearbox#this> a cold:Specification ; rdfs:label "Automatic Gearbox"@en .

Possible choices

Link to Laguna Hatchback with automatic gearbox

Previous selections(encoded in the URI,in clear in the data)

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The "Laguna Hatchback, automatic gearbox"

<http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/c/BAv/AAMDg#this> a cold:Configuration ; cold:chosenSpec <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/LA3#this> , <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/PT1633_automatic_gearbox#this> cold:possible [ a cold:ConfigurationLink ; cold:linkedConf <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/c/BAv/AAMDg#this> ; cold:specToBeAdded <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/PT1628_diesel#this> ] ; cold:possible [ a cold:ConfigurationLink ; ...

gr:hasPriceSpecification [gr:hasCurrencyValue "21795"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#float>...] ; cold:impliedSpec <http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/BAv/PT1627_direct_common_rail_with_turbo#this>,... cold:impossible [ a cold:ConfigurationLink ;...

Possible choices

More info

Previous selections(encoded in the URI,in clear in the data)

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Scenic / Fuel Type Diesel / Gearbox Type Automatic Gearbox / Sunrooffr.co.rplug.renault.com/.../scenic/diesel_auto_sunroof html€19,145.00 to €21,085.00

#this a cold:Configuration, schema:Product, schema:ProductModel; schema:name "Scenic / Fuel Type Diesel / Gearbox Type Automatic Gearbox"@en; schema:offers [ a schema:Offer; schema:price "19145.0"; schema:priceCurrency "EUR" ]; cold:chosenSpec <http://fr.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/scenic#this>, <http://fr.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/PT1628_diesel#this>, <http://fr.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/PT1633_automatic_gearbox#this>; cold:possible [ a cold:ConfigurationLink; cold:specToBeAdded <http://fr.co.rplug.renault.com/spec/scenic/climate_control#this>; cold:linkedConf <http://127.0.0.1:7070/C2GWeb/c/BAEn/AANnWm#this>; cold:chosenSpec <http://127.0.0.1:7070/C2GWeb/product/fg/X95/2/BI/2011/spec/M3B#this>, <http://127.0.0.1:7070/C2GWeb/product/gen/spec/PT1628_diesel#this>, <http://127.0.0.1:7070/C2GWeb/product/gen/spec/PT1633_automatic_gearbox#this>; cold:completedAtSamePrice <http://127.0.0.1:7070/C2GWeb/c/BAEn/AANnWk?complete=minprice&complete=arbitrary>;

Configuration URI

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Search engines can effectively index these data Accurate description of the range, that can be explored by crawlers

just a matter of following links

But 10^20 is huge: partial indexing

Some specifications have more value than others:

search engines can choose the links they want to follow (the meaning of each link being tagged by the specification)

publishers can provide hints

sitemap, no-follow directive

Handling typical user requests easily manageable

Typical request: a few specifications (4?)

"diesel sunroof climate control"

Number of popular features by car model: 15?

-> less than 2000 configurations need to be indexed / car model

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Proposal for Schema.org Use a streamlined version of COLD for the description of customizable

products

(Some properties being needed by advanced configurator applications only)

Bare minimum: a new Feature (or "ProductFeature") class, and a new feature property

an idea shared by several extension proposals

Beware, to the semantics of the feature property

must *not* to be used when a feature is only possible

Allows consumer applications to correctly index a configuration by its features

but they don't get the "smart links" provided by cold:possible

publisher can use the sitemap file of its site to point search engines to configurations

cold:possible and cold:ConfigurationLink too complex for Schema.org?

just a matter of reification

what Schema.org seems to want to handle

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Conclusion Ranges of customizable products can be described as Linked Data

Accurate descriptions of complex ranges of products, that can be effectively indexed by search engines

With minimal additions to Schema.org, the description of configurable products such as cars could gain momentum, opening new opportunities.

RDF description:

http://doc.rplug.renault.com/car-configurator/cold/coldjs/configurator.html

http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/product/gen?as=ttl

Simple car configurator with RDFa / schema.org markup:

http://uk.co.rplug.renault.com/product/gen?embed=true

Renault range as Linked Data: