README.md

It is important to be able to trace the lineage of data. Within DPROD, this can be done in two ways: at a high level from one data product to another and, if desired, at the more detailed level of the underlying datasets.

High Level Lineage: Between Data Products

Data products have input and output ports, and one data product’s input port will point to another data product’s output port.

This allows a user to query the lineage. The data products all have URLs as identifiers, and properties all connect to each other, so a query can walk from one data product to the downstream data products that feed it.

One can follow the path that leads from one data product to another like this:

Data Product >> inputPort >> isAccessServiceOf >> isDistributionOf >> Input Data Product 

The following example data has three data products that connect to each other through their input and output ports:

{
  "@context": "https://www.omg.org/spec/DPROD/dprod-context.jsonld",
  "dataProducts": [
    {
      "id": "https://y.com/data-product/company-finance",
      "type": "DataProduct",
      "inputPort": [
        {
          "id": "https://y.com/data-product/company-sales/port/2025-sales",
          "type": "DataService"
        },
        {
          "id": "https://y.com/data-product/company-hr/port/2025-payroll",
          "type": "DataService"
        }
      ],
      "outputPort": {
        "id": "https://y.com/data-product/company-sales/port/2025-balance-sheet",
        "type": "DataService",
        "label": "Balance Sheet",
        "endpointURL": "https://y.com/data-product/company-sales/port/2025-c",
        "isAccessServiceOf": {
          "type": "Distribution",
          "format": "https://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/application/json",
          "isDistributionOf": {
            "type": "Dataset",
            "id": "https://y.com/data-product/company-sales/dataset/2025-balance-sheet",
            "conformsTo": "https://y.com/schema/BalanceSheet"
          }
        }
      }
    },
    {
      "id": "https://y.com/data-product/company-sales",
      "type": "DataProduct",
      "outputPort": {
        "id": "https://y.com/data-product/company-sales/port/2025-sales",
        "type": "DataService",
        "label": "Sales",
        "endpointURL": "https://y.com/data-product/company-sales/port/2025-sales",
        "isAccessServiceOf": {
          "type": "Distribution",
          "format": "https://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/application/json",
          "isDistributionOf": {
            "type": "Dataset",
            "label": "Sales",
            "id": "https://y.com/data-product/company-sales/dataset/2025-sales",
            "conformsTo": "https://y.com/schema/Sale"
          }
        }
      }
    },
    {
      "id": "https://y.com/data-product/company-hr",
      "type": "DataProduct",
      "outputPort": {
        "id": "https://y.com/data-product/company-sales/port/2025-payroll",
        "type": "DataService",
        "label": "Payroll",
        "endpointURL": "https://y.com/data-product/company-hr/port/2025-payroll",
        "isAccessServiceOf": {
          "type": "Distribution",
          "format": "https://www.iana.org/assignments/media-types/text/csv",
          "isDistributionOf": {
            "type": "Dataset",
            "label": "Payroll",
            "id": "https://y.com/data-product/company-sales/dataset/2025-payroll",
            "conformsTo": "https://y.com/schema/Payroll"
          }
        }
      }
    }
  ]
}

Given this example data, starting at the data product https://y.com/data-product/company-finance, one could walk the relationships to find the input data products that feed it:

https://y.com/data-product/company-finance >> 
    :inputPort >> 
    :isAccessServiceOf >> 
    :isDistributionOf >> [
        https://y.com/data-product/company-sales, 
        https://y.com/data-product/company-hr
    ]

In Linked Data, this would use a query such as:

PREFIX :      <https://y.com/data-product/>
PREFIX rdfs:  <http://www.w3.org/2000/01/rdf-schema#>
PREFIX dprod: <https://www.omg.org/spec/DPROD/>

SELECT DISTINCT ?input
WHERE
{ 
  :company-finance dprod:inputPort ?inputPort .
  ?inputPort dprod:isAccessServiceOf/dprod:isDistributionOf/rdfs:label ?input .
}

Detailed Level: Between Datasets

To track lineage at a more granular level, one can also use PROV (https://www.w3.org/TR/prov-o/) at the dataset level.

dap:atnf-P366-2003SEPT
  rdf:type dcat:Dataset ;
  dcterms:bibliographicCitation "Burgay, M; McLaughlin, M; Kramer, M; Lyne, A; Joshi, B; Pearce, G; D'Amico, N; Possenti, A; Manchester, R; Camilo, F (2017): Parkes observations for project P366 semester 2003SEPT. v1. CSIRO. Data Collection. https://doi.org/10.4225/08/598dc08d07bb7" ;
  dcterms:title "Parkes observations for project P366 semester 2003SEPT"@en ;
  dcat:landingPage <https://data.csiro.au/dap/landingpage?pid=csiro:P366-2003SEPT> ;
  prov:wasGeneratedBy dap:P366 ;
  .

dap:P366
  rdf:type prov:Activity ;
  dcterms:type <http://dbpedia.org/resource/Observation> ;
  prov:startedAtTime "2000-11-01"^^xsd:date ;
  prov:used dap:Parkes-radio-telescope ;
  prov:wasInformedBy dap:ATNF ;
  rdfs:label "P366 - Parkes multibeam high-latitude pulsar survey"@en ;
  rdfs:seeAlso <https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1365-2966.2006.10100.x> ;
  .

See: https://www.w3.org/TR/vocab-dcat-3/#examples-dataset-provenance.