(provided by application): The overall objective is to provide innovative software tools that facilitate the acquisition, integration, and dissemination of multimedia biomedical data over the web, thereby reducing the cost of knowledge sharing. There is a lack of high-level web application development tools suitable for use by researchers, clinician, and educators who are not skilled programmers. Our Web Interfacing Repository Manager (Wirm) is a software toolkit that reduces the complexity of building custom biomedical web applications. Wirm's visual modeling tools enable domain experts to describe the structure of their knowledge, from which Wirm automatically generates full-featured, customizable content management systems. All Phase I goals were met or exceeded, resulting in the implementation of multiple biomedical web applications, including an electronic collaboration environment for neuroscientists. The success of Phase I revealed Wirm's applicability to be wider than originally anticipated. The Phase II title has been updated accordingly. The Phase II specific aims are 1) extend the power of Wirm's visual interfaces for semantic modeling and context-sensitive presentation, 2) increase Wirm's scalability and security, 3) support connectivity to DICOM sources and XML-aware applications, 4) evaluate new features through software usability studies, and 5) foster collaborative development of an online clearinghouse for sharing domain schemas.
At the end of Phase II, we will have created an application server suitable for widespread adoption by researchers, clinicians, and educators. We will supply this technology to research institutions, medical schools, and teaching hospitals, and become a leading provider of web hosted applications, consulting services, and support-contracts to Wirm users.
| Jakobovits, Rex M; Rosse, Cornelius; Brinkley, James F (2002) WIRM: an open source toolkit for building biomedical web applications. J Am Med Inform Assoc 9:557-70 |
