What is it?


What is required?


VALERIE is the VirtuAl LEaRnIng Environment (VLE) for UNL. It was created to teach students and language specialists to deal with natural language engineering, especially for the Universal Networking Language (UNL), and mainly in the framework of the UNLarium, a database management system used to produce language resources for UNL-based systems. VALERIE is an open and free environment. Anyone may apply to any certificate. Candidates are not required to have any previous experience in natural language processing or UNL but are expected to have some acquaintance with basic concepts of descriptive Linguistics and some knowledge of English. Undergraduate and postgraduate students of Language Studies, translators, interpreters and language specialists are especially welcomed.

What is in there?


What does it imply?


VALERIE comprises several different certificates. They are used to accredit candidates to work with UNL-driven engines and tools. Each certificate is divided into several different levels, which must be overtaken by candidates in order to be approved. Each level consists of a brief theoretical explanation and some exercises, which are evaluated automatically. Successful candidates are grant a permission to work within the UNLarium. Obtaining a certificate does not commit neither candidates nor the UNDL Foundation to any obligation. It just attests that you have reached a standard of knowledge and are ready to create dictionary entries, grammar rules and UNL documents in the UNLarium framework. This may turn out to be an interesting freelance work, depending on your language and on the project. [see the call for participation]

What to do?


Who are you?


In VALERIE, candidates are expected to address ordinary problems in natural language engineering, such as creating dictionary entries and grammar rules, mapping natural language documents into UNL, and so on. The theory is presented in English, but the exercises may include samples from other languages. In any case, the English translation will be always provided. The UNDL Foundation is a non-profit organization established in Geneva, Switzerland, since January 2001. Accredited by the United Nations since 2004, its mission is to promote reciprocal knowledge exchange among cultures and mutual understanding among peoples through multilingual communication. [read more]

How long does it take?


What is UNL?


To obtain a certificate, you have to go through a set of problems. This may take one day or one month, depending on your availability and expertise. In any case, the certificates are not time-constrained. You may stop the evaluation at any time and resume it later. The Universal Networking Language (UNL) has been, since 1996, a unique initiative to reduce language barriers and strengthen cross-cultural communication in the framework of the United Nations. It is a knowledge representation language that has been used for several different tasks in natural language engineering, such as machine translation, multilingual document generation, summarization, information retrieval and semantic reasoning. [read more]