Dinny McGinley TD., Minister of State at the Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, launched an international placenames workshop today in The Helix, Dublin City University, Dublin. The theme of the workshop is the
management and dissemination of toponymic data online.
The workshop was organized by Fiontar, Dublin City University, in collaboration with the Placenames Branch, Department of Arts, Heritage and the Gaeltacht. The Placenames Database of Ireland (logainm.ie) is being developed by Fiontar since 2007 in collaboration with the Placenames Branch. Logainm.ie is a public Web site which provides the official Irish-language versions of approximately 100,000 places throughout the country. Logainm.ie has attracted 5.8 million hits, constituting 722,102 visits from 358,702 unique visitors since its launch in 2008. Given the role that logainm.ie plays in managing and providing access to Irish-language placenames, the theme of management and dissemination of toponymic data online is an important one to Fiontar and the Placenames Branch. The international context of this workshop is particularly important as an opportunity to investigate innovations and developments and exchange ideas and expertise. Speakers from countries far and near were invited to give papers, for example speakers from Wales, Scotland, Norway, Sweden, Finland, Estonia and Canada.
The aim of this workshop is to create a forum to present current innovative perspectives of researchers and industrial practitioners in the area of toponymy. It is hoped that the exchange of ideas at this conference (and, later, through the Proceedings) will lead to new debates (and, perhaps, new partnerships) in this exciting area. The workshop focussed on three principal themes:
1. Placenames research.
2. Technical solutions for the management of toponymic data.
3. Mapping solutions, including (i) Synchronization of toponymic data between databases and (ii) Bilingual/multilingual toponymic data.
Speaking at the launch, Minister McGinley said: "The speakers represent highly innovative organisations in many different countries. They were invited to give papers on the basis of their complementary and diverse contributions to these three themes. The international context of this workshop is particularly important as an opportunity to investigate innovations and developments and exchange ideas and expertise".....
"It is hoped that the exchange of ideas at this workshop (and, later, through the Proceedings) will lead to new debates (and, perhaps, new partnerships) in the exciting area of management and dissemination of toponymic data online".