---
title: "Creation and Evaluation of Extensible Language Resources for"
description: "This paper describes how the project built an extensible resource infrastructure for it. 22 references."
authors: ["Angelo Dalli"]
year: 2002
venue: "Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC'02)"
source: "https://aclanthology.org/L02-1132/"
licence: "CC BY-NC 4.0 (ELRA, LREC proceedings)"
licence_url: "https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/"
summary_licence: "Elamur Cosmic License"
canonical: "https://research.elamur.ai/free/en/papers/dalli-2002-creation-evaluation-extensible-language-resources/"
---
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# Creation and Evaluation of Extensible Language Resources for Maltese

**Authors:** Angelo Dalli · **Year:** 2002 · **Venue:** [Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC'02)](https://md.research.elamur.ai/free/en/venues/lrec/) ([LREC 2002](https://md.research.elamur.ai/free/en/venues/lrec/2002/)) · **Publisher:** [European Language Resources Association (ELRA)](https://md.research.elamur.ai/free/en/publishers/european-language-resources-association-elra/) · **Licence:** [CC BY-NC 4.0 (ELRA, LREC proceedings)](https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/)

**Links:** [Publisher's page](https://aclanthology.org/L02-1132/) · [PDF](https://aclanthology.org/L02-1132.pdf) · [OpenAlex](https://openalex.org/W2402151537)

**Citations:** 4 citations (OpenAlex, 2026-10-14)

## Summary
Maltese lacked large computerised language resources until the University of Malta launched its Maltilex Project. Maltese is a mixed language with an Arabic-based morphology and syntax, a large Romance vocabulary and loosely integrated English borrowings. This paper describes how the project built an extensible resource infrastructure for it.

A weakly supervised method called the Lexicon Structuring Technique (LST) automatically grouped word forms from a raw corpus under lemmas. This produced the core of a computational lexicon. The lexicon sits in a relational database whose fields map onto XCES, and new functionality can be added through an extension API.

For interoperability, the author proposes a web-services model. Each resource is wrapped by a SOAP server and described with WSDL and UDDI, and a conversion layer hides the resource's internal format.

The paper also introduces two evaluation measures, L-Measure and C-Measure. They suit minority languages because no gold-standard resource is needed for comparison. The work matters as a template for building and exposing resources for under-resourced languages from scratch.

## Key points
- The starting corpus was roughly 3,000 Maltese texts with over 2 million word forms. LST produced a lexicon of about 80,000 lemmas, and the paper also reports around 60,000 unique word forms.
- LST draws on bioinformatics and data-mining principles. It assigns each lemma a headword chosen from one of its grouped word forms.
- The core lexicon stores orthographic and phonological information and maps almost directly to XCES. The project also built an XCES-compliant tagset for Maltese (Gatt, 2001).
- Resources are exposed through a SOAP server described in WSDL, with UDDI for registration. An example service, `LRCoreService`, offers the function `getEtymology`, which returns language codes for a word's etymological source.
- The C-Measure ranges from 1 (full coverage) down to −γ (no coverage). γ reflects confidence in corpus quality and would be set to 0.95 in the paper's example. The L-Measure combines recall and precision with a harmonic-mean formula.

## Interesting ideas
- Use the lemma rather than the individual word form as the unit of reference: store irregular forms explicitly and generate the regular ones by rule, which keeps the lexicon compact and lets relations attach once per lemma.
- Keep data in a fast relational store and convert it to XML only on export, filtering with SQL before conversion instead of running costly transformations over everything.
- Wrap each resource behind a two-way conversion layer that translates its native format into a standard core interface and back, so other tools can both read and update it.
- Measure lexicon coverage against several reference dictionaries without a gold standard, and weight each mismatch by how far those references can be trusted.
- Assign a service to each major component and expose its smaller operations as functions, so the number of top-level services stays manageable.

## For Mova

How these ideas could serve Mova, our small open language model — its files, stages and tests:

- **I1** (tokens): The `en` lexicon could keep only exceptional inflections per lemma and derive the rest, so lemma-level facts don't need duplicating across forms.
- **I2** (world): Compiled knowledge from WordNet, FrameNet and Wikidata could live in an indexed store, with interchange formats produced only for the requested slice.
- **I3** (tree): UD dialect conversion could be built as reversible adapters around each treebank, making round-trip loss directly testable.
- **I4** (learn): Silver-data evaluation could split disagreements into "only ours" and "only the witness" buckets, with weights tied to witness reliability.
- **I5** (answer): Readers and students could expose a few coarse entry points with fine-grained calls inside, which keeps explanations and APIs easy to navigate.

*Our summary of the paper, in our own words — not its text. The work belongs to its authors; read it at the links above.*

## Institutions

- [University of Malta](https://md.research.elamur.ai/free/en/universities/university-of-malta/) — University, Msida, Malta · 16 works · 775 citations

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## Cite

Cite as: Angelo Dalli. 2002. Creation and Evaluation of Extensible Language Resources for Maltese. Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC'02).

The paper itself, not this page. BibTeX from the library's record of the work.

```bibtex
@inproceedings{dalli2002creation,
  title = {{Creation and Evaluation of Extensible Language Resources for Maltese}},
  author = {Angelo Dalli},
  booktitle = {Proceedings of the Third International Conference on Language Resources and Evaluation (LREC'02)},
  year = {2002},
  doi = {10.63317/3bsq7teff7b8},
  url = {https://doi.org/10.63317/3bsq7teff7b8}
}
```

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## References

22 references, 0 of them with a card of ours. ↗ leads to the work, «find» searches for one we have no id for yet.

1. Aquilina, Joseph. 1973. The structure of Maltese: a study in mixed grammar and vocabulary. University of Malta. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Aquilina%2C+Joseph%2E+1973%2E+The+structure+of+Maltese%3A+a+study+in+mixed+grammar+and+vocabulary%2E+University+of+Malta%2E)
2. Ariba Inc. International Business Machines Corporation. Microsoft Corporation. September 2000. UDDI Technical White Paper. [http://www.uddi.org](http://www.uddi.org). [↗](http://www.uddi.org)
3. Bertagna, Francesca. Calzolari, Nicoletta. Lenci, Alessandro. Zampolli, Antonio. 2001. The Multilingual ISLE Lexicon Entry (MILE). ISLE Computational Lexicons Working Group Report, Italy. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Bertagna%2C+Francesca%2E+Calzolari%2C+Nicoletta%2E+Lenci%2C+Alessandro%2E+Zampolli%2C+Antonio%2E+2001%2E+The+Multilingual+ISLE+Lexicon+Entry+%28MILE%29%2E+ISLE+Computational+Lexicons+Working+Group+Report%2C+Italy%2E)
4. Box, Don et. al. 2000. Simple Object Access Protocol 1.1. W3C Note. [http://www.w3.org/TR/SOAP](http://www.w3.org/TR/SOAP). [↗](http://www.w3.org/TR/SOAP)
5. Christensen, Erik et. al. 2001. Web Services Description Language 1.1. W3C Note. [http://www.w3.org/TR/wsdl](http://www.w3.org/TR/wsdl). [↗](http://www.w3.org/TR/wsdl)
6. Comrie, Bernard. 1987. The major languages of South Asia, the Middle East and Africa. Routledge. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Comrie%2C+Bernard%2E+1987%2E+The+major+languages+of+South+Asia%2C+the+Middle+East+and+Africa%2E+Routledge%2E)
7. Cunningham, Hamish. 1999. A Definition and Short History of Language Engineering. Journal of Natural Language Engineering, Cambridge University Press, 5: 1-16. [↗](https://doi.org/10.1017/s1351324999002144)
8. Curbera, Francisco. Ehnebuske, David. Rogers, Dan. June 2001. Using WSDL in a UDDI Registry. UDDI Working Draft Best Practices Document version 1.05. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Curbera%2C+Francisco%2E+Ehnebuske%2C+David%2E+Rogers%2C+Dan%2E+June+2001%2E+Using+WSDL+in+a+UDDI+Registry%2E+UDDI+Working+Draft+Best+Practices+Document+version+1%2E05%2E)
9. Dalli, Angelo. 2001. Interoperable Extensible Linguistic Databases. IRCS Workshop on Linguistics Databases, University of Pennsylvania. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Dalli%2C+Angelo%2E+2001%2E+Interoperable+Extensible+Linguistic+Databases%2E+IRCS+Workshop+on+Linguistics+Databases%2C+University+of+Pennsylvania%2E)
10. Dalli, Angelo. 2002. Biologically Inspired Lexicon Structuring Technique. Human Language Technology (HLT) 2002, San Diego, California. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Dalli%2C+Angelo%2E+2002%2E+Biologically+Inspired+Lexicon+Structuring+Technique%2E+Human+Language+Technology+%28HLT%29+2002%2C+San+Diego%2C+California%2E)
11. Expert Advisory Group on Language Engineering Standards (EAGLES). 2000. Corpus Encoding Standard for XML. Vassar College, New York. Equipe Langue et Dialogue LORIA/CNRS, France. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Expert+Advisory+Group+on+Language+Engineering+Standards+%28EAGLES%29%2E+2000%2E+Corpus+Encoding+Standard+for+XML%2E+Vassar+College%2C+New+York%2E+Equipe+Langue+et+Dialogue+LORIA%2FCNRS%2C+France%2E)
12. Gatt, Albert. 2001. An XCES compliant tagset for Maltese. Maltilex Project, University of Malta. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Gatt%2C+Albert%2E+2001%2E+An+XCES+compliant+tagset+for+Maltese%2E+Maltilex+Project%2C+University+of+Malta%2E)
13. Larsen, B. Aone, C. 1999. Fast and Effective Text Mining using Linear-Time Document Clustering. KD-99, San Diego, California. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Larsen%2C+B%2E+Aone%2C+C%2E+1999%2E+Fast+and+Effective+Text+Mining+using+Linear%2DTime+Document+Clustering%2E+KD%2D99%2C+San+Diego%2C+California%2E)
14. Mifsud, Manwel. 1995. Loan verbs in Maltese: a descriptive and comparative study, pg. 25. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Mifsud%2C+Manwel%2E+1995%2E+Loan+verbs+in+Maltese%3A+a+descriptive+and+comparative+study%2C+pg%2E+25%2E)
15. Open Archives Initiative (OAI). 2001. The Open Archives Initiative Protocol for Metadata Harvesting. [http://www.openarchives.org](http://www.openarchives.org). [↗](http://www.openarchives.org)
16. Rijsbergen, C. J. 1979. Information Retrieval. Butterworth, London. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Rijsbergen%2C+C%2E+J%2E+1979%2E+Information+Retrieval%2E+Butterworth%2C+London%2E)
17. Rosner, Michael et. al. 1999. Linguistic and Computational Aspects of Maltilex. Proc. of the ATLAS Symposium, Tunis. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Rosner%2C+Michael+et%2E+al%2E+1999%2E+Linguistic+and+Computational+Aspects+of+Maltilex%2E+Proc%2E+of+the+ATLAS+Symposium%2C+Tunis%2E)
18. Shannon, Claude. 1948. The mathematical theory of communication. Bell Systems Technical Journal, 27:379-423, 623-656. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Shannon%2C+Claude%2E+1948%2E+The+mathematical+theory+of+communication%2E+Bell+Systems+Technical+Journal%2C+27%3A379%2D423%2C+623%2D656%2E)
19. Steinbach, Michael. Karypis, George. Kumar, Vipin. 1999. A comparison of document clustering techniques. Technical Report #00-034, University of Minnesota. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Steinbach%2C+Michael%2E+Karypis%2C+George%2E+Kumar%2C+Vipin%2E+1999%2E+A+comparison+of+document+clustering+techniques%2E+Technical+Report+%2300%2D034%2C+University+of+Minnesota%2E)
20. UDDI Consortium. 2001. UDDI Version 2.0 Data Structure Reference. [http://www.uddi.org/pubs](http://www.uddi.org/pubs). [↗](http://www.uddi.org/pubs)
21. Wilks, Yorick. Gaizauskas, Robert. Cunningham, Hamish. 1998. GATE: General Architecture for Text Engineering. Sheffield University, UK. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Wilks%2C+Yorick%2E+Gaizauskas%2C+Robert%2E+Cunningham%2C+Hamish%2E+1998%2E+GATE%3A+General+Architecture+for+Text+Engineering%2E+Sheffield+University%2C+UK%2E)
22. Zampolli, Antonio. 2000. Extensions of PAROLE & SIMPLE resources: National Projects. SIMPLE: From Monolingual to Multilingual Resources Workshop, Athens. [find](https://scholar.google.com/scholar?q=Zampolli%2C+Antonio%2E+2000%2E+Extensions+of+PAROLE+%26+SIMPLE+resources%3A+National+Projects%2E+SIMPLE%3A+From+Monolingual+to+Multilingual+Resources+Workshop%2C+Athens%2E)

*Updated 24 October 2026*