Introducing Semantika
An interview with Nina Zagoranski, the CEO of Semantika.
Who is Semantika, what is your mission?
Semantika is a software development company based in Maribor, Slovenia. We’re the leading provider of museum documentation software and related services in Slovenia, with our collections management system Galis being used in almost every Slovenian museum and gallery.
We have over 10 years of experience in software development, web solutions, mobile and multi-touch applications, specializing in natural user interfaces and human-computer interaction.
We love what we do. An inspiring work environment and customer satisfaction are our main priorities and this is what makes us better every day.
How is Semantika involved in Europeana Creative?
We started as a part of the Natural History Pilot team, working closely with the Natural History Museum in Prague to develop an educational game showcasing the potential to re-use Europe's digitized cultural heritage, available on Europeana. The development of the Memory Match game – a classic game of finding pairs combined with a natural history quiz - is well under way. We think it’s very cute and fits the Europeana project perfectly.
The first screen of the Memory Match app (CC BY-SA Europeana Creative)
A few months into the project we got an even greater role in the project – we took over the development of the Europeana Labs portal, one of the most important outcomes of the whole project. Europeana Labs is a novel Open Innovation platform that sets out to provide its community of users with everything needed to get started using the Europeana APIs. The portal is already live in the beta stage and we are looking forward to further development.
Semantika is involved in three European projects at the moment. Each one of them is a different story, but they all teach us valuable lessons of cooperation, planning, compromising and flexibility. The best part by far is the networking, meeting people from all over Europe and expanding horizons while travelling around.
Tell us more about the pilot you are working on.
Europeana Creative is a big project with many partners. It’s been quite a challenge to even come up with the idea of the pilot, but now it’s much fun working on it. We love the design part with all the cute illustrations and the process of refining the idea, so that the game gets better and better with each iteration.
Many different people are involved in the pilot, so the feedback is very diverse and interesting. We’re learning and improving all the time!
Find out more about the Europeana Creative pilots here.
What piece of advice do you want to give people on the way?
Stop dreaming and start doing! It probably won't be easy, but you should never give up. Hard work always pays off – one way or another. If you find something you love to do, then you'll never have to work a day in your life! ;)
Select the set of cards and the difficulty of the game (CC BY-SA Europeana Creative)
A quiz question appears after a pair is found (CC BY-SA Europeana Creative)
Explore objects in Europeana and create your own set of cards to play with (CC BY-SA Europeana Creative)