OpenRiC inisiative (Open-source RiC)
Johan Pieterse
We would like to share progress from The Archive and Heritage Group on an open-source initiative to make RiC implementation practical, operational, and usable in real archival environments.
Through OpenRiC, we are building a RiC-native open-source architecture focused on linked archival context, graph services, semantic interoperability, mappings, validation, and standards-aligned implementation. OpenRiC is designed to support both standalone semantic scenarios and integration into production archival systems. (OpenRiC)
Alongside this, we have developed Heratio, where we have modernised the AtoM application layer in Laravel while keeping the established AtoM database. This allows us to retain the strength of the underlying archival data foundation while overcoming legacy application limitations and creating space for more advanced RiC-aligned development. (OpenRiC)
The result is a model where traditional archival description and RiC contextual rendering can coexist over the same data. Users can continue to work in familiar operational workflows, while the platform enables richer contextual relationships, graph exploration, semantic outputs, provenance-aware structures, and linked-data integration. (OpenRiC)
A current example in Heratio demonstrates this direction through the Egyptian Boat object, combining archival description, digital object management, and contextual provenance presentation in one interface. (Heratio)
We see this as part of a broader effort to move RiC from discussion into implementation through open-source collaboration. We would welcome engagement from others interested in RiC-O, modelling, mappings, RDF, graph infrastructure, interoperability, and archival system design. (OpenRiC)
OpenRiC: openric.org
Example: heratio.theahg.co.za/egyptian-boat
Demo: lou...@theahg.co.za / Password@123
Arian Rajh
10.04.2026., u 11:10, korisnik Johan Pieterse <pieters...@gmail.com> je napisao:
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Johan Pieterse
What Heratio does have:
- RiC-O ontology support via the ahg-ric package - it serializes archival descriptions into RiC JSON-LD (see RicSerializationService)
- Fuseki/SPARQL triplestore sync - the Fuseki settings allow connecting to an Apache Jena Fuseki instance where RDF triples are stored and queried
- SKOS import - the term taxonomy system (ahg-term-taxonomy) supports importing SKOS RDF/XML files (both file upload and remote URL), which is a RDF serialization
- JSON-LD export per record - individual records can be exported as RiC JSON-LD via /admin/ric/export/jsonld
- Semantic search with thesaurus/synonym expansion, which conceptually operates in linked-data territory
What it doesn't do (yet):
- There's no generic "upload a TTL/N-Triples/RDF-XML file and have it create archival descriptions" pipeline. The ingest wizard (ahg-ingest) handles CSV and file batch imports, not arbitrary RDF.
- The RiC sync is outbound (Heratio → Fuseki), not primarily inbound (TTL → Heratio records). Heratio is the source of truth; the triplestore is a derived index.
- There's no SPARQL endpoint exposed BY Heratio — it pushes to Fuseki, which then serves SPARQL queries externally.