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An annotation is extra information associated with a particular point in a
document A document is a written, drawn, presented, or memorialized representation of thought, often the manifestation of non-fictional, as well as fictional, content. The word originates from the Latin ''Documentum'', which denotes a "teaching" or ...
or other piece of information. It can be a note that includes a comment or explanation. Annotations are sometimes presented in the margin of book pages. For annotations of different digital media, see web annotation and
text annotation Text annotation is the practice and the result of adding a note or gloss to a text, which may include highlights or underlining, comments, footnotes, tags, and links. Text annotations can include notes written for a reader's private purposes, as ...
.


Literature and education


Textual scholarship

Textual scholarship Textual scholarship (or textual studies) is an umbrella term for disciplines that deal with describing, transcribing, editing or annotating texts and physical documents. Overview Textual research is mainly historically oriented. Textual scholars s ...
is a discipline that often uses the technique of annotation to describe or add additional historical context to texts and physical documents to make it easier to understand.


Student uses

Students often
highlight Highlight or Highlights may refer to: In arts and entertainment * Highlight (band), a South Korean boy group ** ''Highlight'' (album), the third album by the group, or its title track"Highlight", *Highlight, a song by South Korean-Japanese girl ...
passages in books in order to refer back to key phrases easily, or add
marginalia Marginalia (or apostils) are marks made in the margins of a book or other document. They may be scribbles, comments, glosses (annotations), critiques, doodles, drolleries, or illuminations. Biblical manuscripts Biblical manuscripts have ...
to aid studying. Annotated bibliographies add commentary on the relevance or quality of each source, in addition to the usual bibliographic information that merely identifies the source.


Mathematical expression annotation

Mathematical expression In mathematics, an expression or mathematical expression is a finite combination of Glossary of mathematical symbols, symbols that is well-formed formula, well-formed according to rules that depend on the context. Mathematical symbols can desi ...
s (symbols and formulae) can be annotated with their natural language meaning. This is essential for disambiguation, since symbols may have different meanings (e.g., "E" can be "energy" or "expectation value", etc.). The annotation process can be facilitated and accelerated through recommendation, e.g., using the "AnnoMathTeX" system that is hosted by Wikimedia.


Learning and instruction

From a cognitive perspective, annotation has an important role in learning and instruction. As part of guided noticing it involves highlighting, naming or labelling and commenting aspects of visual representations to help focus learners' attention on specific visual aspects. In other words, it means the assignment of typological representations (culturally meaningful categories), to topological representations (e.g. images). This is especially important when experts, such as medical doctors, interpret visualizations in detail and explain their interpretations to others, for example by means of digital technology. Here, annotation can be a way to establish common ground between interactants with different levels of knowledge. The value of annotation has been empirically confirmed, for example, in a study which shows that in computer-based teleconsultations the integration of image annotation and speech leads to significantly improved knowledge exchange compared with the use of images and speech without annotation.


On YouTube

Annotations were removed on January 15, 2019 from
YouTube YouTube is a global online video platform, online video sharing and social media, social media platform headquartered in San Bruno, California. It was launched on February 14, 2005, by Steve Chen, Chad Hurley, and Jawed Karim. It is owned by ...
after around a decade of service. They had allowed users to provide information that popped up during videos, but YouTube indicated they did not work well on small mobile screens, and were being abused.


Software and engineering


Text documents

Markup language Markup language refers to a text-encoding system consisting of a set of symbols inserted in a text document to control its structure, formatting, or the relationship between its parts. Markup is often used to control the display of the document ...
s like
XML Extensible Markup Language (XML) is a markup language and file format for storing, transmitting, and reconstructing arbitrary data. It defines a set of rules for encoding documents in a format that is both human-readable and machine-readable. T ...
and
HTML The HyperText Markup Language or HTML is the standard markup language for documents designed to be displayed in a web browser. It can be assisted by technologies such as Cascading Style Sheets (CSS) and scripting languages such as JavaScri ...
annotate text in a way that is syntactically distinguishable from that text. They can be used to add information about the desired visual presentation, or machine-readable semantic information, as in the semantic web.


Source control

The "annotate" function (also known as "blame" or "praise") used in
source control In software engineering, version control (also known as revision control, source control, or source code management) is a class of systems responsible for managing changes to computer programs, documents, large web sites, or other collections o ...
systems such as
Git Git () is a distributed version control system: tracking changes in any set of files, usually used for coordinating work among programmers collaboratively developing source code during software development. Its goals include speed, data inte ...
,
Team Foundation Server Azure DevOps Server (formerly Team Foundation Server (TFS) and Visual Studio Team System (VSTS)) is a Microsoft product that provides version control (either with Team Foundation Version Control (TFVC) or Git), reporting, requirements management ...
and
Subversion Subversion () refers to a process by which the values and principles of a system in place are contradicted or reversed in an attempt to transform the established social order and its structures of power, authority, hierarchy, and social norms. Sub ...
determines who committed changes to the source code into the repository. This outputs a copy of the source code where each line is annotated with the name of the last contributor to edit that line (and possibly a revision number). This can help establish blame in the event a change caused a malfunction, or identify the author of brilliant code.


Java annotations

A special case is the
Java programming language Java is a high-level, class-based, object-oriented programming language that is designed to have as few implementation dependencies as possible. It is a general-purpose programming language intended to let programmers ''write once, run anywh ...
, where annotations can be used as a special form of syntactic
metadata Metadata is "data that provides information about other data", but not the content of the data, such as the text of a message or the image itself. There are many distinct types of metadata, including: * Descriptive metadata – the descriptive ...
in the source code. Classes, methods, variables, parameters and packages may be annotated. The annotations can be embedded in class files generated by the compiler and may be retained by the
Java virtual machine A Java virtual machine (JVM) is a virtual machine that enables a computer to run Java programs as well as programs written in other languages that are also compiled to Java bytecode. The JVM is detailed by a specification that formally describes ...
and thus influence the run-time behaviour of an application. It is possible to create meta-annotations out of the existing ones in Java.


Image annotation

Automatic image annotation is used to classify images for
image retrieval An image retrieval system is a computer system used for browsing, searching and retrieving images from a large database of digital images. Most traditional and common methods of image retrieval utilize some method of adding metadata such as caption ...
systems.


Computational biology

Since the 1980s,
molecular biology Molecular biology is the branch of biology that seeks to understand the molecular basis of biological activity in and between cells, including biomolecular synthesis, modification, mechanisms, and interactions. The study of chemical and physi ...
and
bioinformatics Bioinformatics () is an interdisciplinary field that develops methods and software tools for understanding biological data, in particular when the data sets are large and complex. As an interdisciplinary field of science, bioinformatics combi ...
have created the need for
DNA annotation DNA annotation or genome annotation is the process of identifying the locations of genes and all of the coding regions in a genome and determining what those genes do. An annotation (irrespective of the context) is a note added by way of explanati ...
. DNA annotation or genome annotation is the process of identifying the locations of genes and all of the coding regions in a genome and determining what those genes do. An annotation (irrespective of the context) is a note added by way of explanation or commentary. Once a genome is sequenced, it needs to be annotated to make sense of it.


Digital imaging

In the
digital imaging Digital imaging or digital image acquisition is the creation of a digital representation of the visual characteristics of an object, such as a physical scene or the interior structure of an object. The term is often assumed to imply or include ...
community the term annotation is commonly used for visible metadata superimposed on an
image An image is a visual representation of something. It can be two-dimensional, three-dimensional, or somehow otherwise feed into the visual system to convey information. An image can be an artifact, such as a photograph or other two-dimensiona ...
without changing the underlying master image, such as
sticky note A Post-it Note (or sticky note) is a small piece of paper with a re-adherable strip of glue on its back, made for temporarily attaching notes to documents and other surfaces. A low-tack pressure-sensitive adhesive allows the notes to be easil ...
s, virtual laser pointers, circles, arrows, and black-outs (cf.
redaction Redaction is a form of editing in which multiple sources of texts are combined and altered slightly to make a single document. Often this is a method of collecting a series of writings on a similar theme and creating a definitive and coherent wo ...
). In the
medical imaging Medical imaging is the technique and process of imaging the interior of a body for clinical analysis and medical intervention, as well as visual representation of the function of some organs or tissues (physiology). Medical imaging seeks to rev ...
community, an annotation is often referred to as a
region of interest A region of interest (often abbreviated ROI) is a sample within a data set identified for a particular purpose. The concept of a ROI is commonly used in many application areas. For example, in medical imaging, the boundaries of a tumor may be def ...
and is encoded in
DICOM Digital Imaging and Communications in Medicine (DICOM) is the standard for the communication and management of medical imaging information and related data. DICOM is most commonly used for storing and transmitting medical images enabling the integ ...
format.


Other uses


Law

In the United States, legal publishers such as
Thomson West Thomson may refer to: Names * Thomson (surname), a list of people with this name and a description of its origin * Thomson baronets, four baronetcies created for persons with the surname Thomson Businesses and organizations * SGS-Thomson Mic ...
and
Lexis Nexis LexisNexis is a part of the RELX corporation that sells data analytics products and various databases that are accessed through online portals, including portals for computer-assisted legal research (CALR), newspaper search, and consumer informa ...
publish annotated versions of
statutes A statute is a formal written enactment of a legislative authority that governs the legal entities of a city, state, or country by way of consent. Typically, statutes command or prohibit something, or declare policy. Statutes are rules made by le ...
, providing information about
court cases Lists of case law cover instances of case law, legal decisions in which the law was analyzed to resolve ambiguities for deciding current cases. They are organized alphabetically, by topic or by country. Alphabetical lists These lists are pan- ...
that have interpreted the statutes. Both the federal
United States Code In the law of the United States, the Code of Laws of the United States of America (variously abbreviated to Code of Laws of the United States, United States Code, U.S. Code, U.S.C., or USC) is the official compilation and codification of the ...
and state statutes are subject to interpretation by the
courts A court is any person or institution, often as a government institution, with the authority to adjudicate legal disputes between parties and carry out the administration of justice in civil, criminal, and administrative matters in accordance ...
, and the annotated statutes are valuable tools in
legal research Legal research is "the process of identifying and retrieving information necessary to support legal decision-making. In its broadest sense, legal research includes each step of a course of action that begins with an analysis of the facts of a probl ...
.


Linguistics

One purpose of annotation is to transform the data into a form suitable for computer-aided analysis. Prior to annotation, an annotation scheme is defined that typically consists of tags. During tagging, transcriptionists manually add tags into transcripts where required linguistical features are identified in an annotation editor. The annotation scheme ensures that the tags are added consistently across the data set and allows for verification of previously tagged data. Aside from tags, more complex forms of linguistic annotation include the annotation of phrases and relations, e.g., in
treebank In linguistics, a treebank is a parsed text corpus that annotates syntactic or semantic sentence structure. The construction of parsed corpora in the early 1990s revolutionized computational linguistics, which benefitted from large-scale empiri ...
s. Many different forms of linguistic annotation have been developed, as well as different formats and tools for creating and managing linguistic annotations, as described, for example, in the Linguistic Annotation Wiki.


See also

*
Abstract (summary) An abstract is a brief summary of a research article, thesis, review, conference proceeding, or any in-depth analysis of a particular subject and is often used to help the reader quickly ascertain the paper's purpose. When used, an abstract always ...
*
Automatic image annotation Automatic image annotation (also known as automatic image tagging or linguistic indexing) is the process by which a computer system automatically assigns metadata in the form of captioning or keywords to a digital image. This application of comput ...
*
Coding (social sciences) Coding may refer to: Computer science * Computer programming, the process of creating and maintaining the source code of computer programs * Line coding, in data storage * Source coding, compression used in data transmission * Coding theory * Ch ...
*
Drama annotation Drama annotation is the process of annotating the metadata of a drama. Given a drama expressed in some medium (text, video, audio, etc.), the process of metadata annotation identifies what are the elements that characterize the drama and annotates ...
*
Comment Comment may refer to: * Comment (linguistics) or rheme, that which is said about the topic (theme) of a sentence * Bernard Comment (born 1960), Swiss writer and publisher Computing * Comment (computer programming), explanatory text or informat ...
(various) *
Footnote A note is a string of text placed at the bottom of a page in a book or document or at the end of a chapter, volume, or the whole text. The note can provide an author's comments on the main text or citations of a reference work in support of the ...
*
Hyperkino Hyperkino is a standardized system of referencing and annotating films on digital carriers – attaching related content and analysis to individual frames. The name of the method, Hyperkino, is based on the intertwining of the concepts of textual c ...
*
Index (publishing) An index (plural: usually indexes, more rarely indices; see below) is a list of words or phrases ('headings') and associated pointers ('locators') to where useful material relating to that heading can be found in a document or collection of doc ...
*
Marginalia Marginalia (or apostils) are marks made in the margins of a book or other document. They may be scribbles, comments, glosses (annotations), critiques, doodles, drolleries, or illuminations. Biblical manuscripts Biblical manuscripts have ...
*
Metadata Metadata is "data that provides information about other data", but not the content of the data, such as the text of a message or the image itself. There are many distinct types of metadata, including: * Descriptive metadata – the descriptive ...
*
Nota Bene (, or ; plural form ) is a Latin phrase meaning "note well". It is often abbreviated as NB, n.b., or with the ligature and first appeared in English writing . In Modern English, it is used, particularly in legal papers, to draw the atten ...
*
Obelus An obelus (plural: obeluses or obeli) is a term in typography that refers to a historical mark which has resolved to three modern meanings: * Division sign * Dagger * Commercial minus sign (limited geographical area of use) The word "obelus ...
, a symbol used on ancient manuscripts to mark passages that were suspected of being corrupted or spurious; the practice of adding such marginal notes became known as
obelism Obelism is the practice of annotating manuscripts with marks set in the margins. Modern obelisms are used by editors when proofreading a manuscript or typescript. Examples are "stet" (which is Latin for "Let it stand", used in this context to me ...
. * PDF annotation *
Subject indexing Subject indexing is the act of describing or classifying a document by index terms, keywords, or other symbols in order to indicate what different documents are ''about'', to summarize their contents or to increase findability. In other words, it ...
*
Semantics Semantics (from grc, σημαντικός ''sēmantikós'', "significant") is the study of reference, meaning, or truth. The term can be used to refer to subfields of several distinct disciplines, including philosophy Philosophy (f ...
*
Tag (metadata) In information systems, a tag is a keyword or term assigned to a piece of information (such as an Internet bookmark, multimedia, database record, or computer file). This kind of metadata helps describe an item and allows it to be found again ...
*
Text annotation Text annotation is the practice and the result of adding a note or gloss to a text, which may include highlights or underlining, comments, footnotes, tags, and links. Text annotations can include notes written for a reader's private purposes, as ...
* Web annotation *
XPS annotation XPS Annotator is a document management software program for Microsoft Windows that allows users to view, annotate, convert, sign and print XPS documents. The software was first released on 12 March 2009 (version 1.0). It was created by Danang Pro ...


References

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