ATLAS: A flexible and extensible architecture for linguistic annotation

We describe a formal model for annotating linguistic artifacts, from which we derive an application programming interface (API) to a tools for manipulating these annotations. The abstract logical model provides for a range of storage formats and promotes the reuse of tools that interact through this API. We focus first on "Annotation Graphs," a graph model for annotations on linear signals (such as text and speech) indexed by intervals, for which efficient database storage and querying techniques are applicable. We note how a wide range of existing annotated corpora can be mapped to this annotation graph model. This model is then generalized to encompass a wider variety of linguistic "signals," including both naturally occuring phenomena (as recorded in images, video, multi-modal interactions, etc.), as well as the derived resources that are increasingly important to the engineering of natural language processing systems (such as word lists, dictionaries, aligned b...

• Type: Journal
• Year: 2000
• Where: CORR
• Authors: Steven Bird, David Day, John S. Garofolo, John Henderson, Christophe Laprun, Mark Liberman
• Keywords: Annotation, Annotation Graph, CORR 2000, Education, Model