A Natural Language Interface for Querying RDF and Graph Databases
Querying big data by using formal languages may result too complex for end users and traditional translation techniques from natural language to SQL, that use generic knowledge, are inadeguate in many real life scenarios. Therefore, many researchers and practitioners are working on the definition of algorithms and systems capable to translate natural language questions into formal query languages able to query big data. In this paper we present a modular system, named MANTRA QA, that enables to accurately translate natural language questions into different formal queries (e.g. SPARQL and Cypher Query) exploiting various knowledge bases. The system we present is based on MANTRA Language a formalism that enables to represent grammar based programs combined with logic predicates to identify concepts and their relations in specific knowledge domains. The MANTRA language makes use of open linked data, thesaurus, and domain ontologies.