Re: reconciliation of disparate models - Jon

Jon points to work by Ron Murray and Barbara Tillett:

    There's another way to look at FRBR in the context of LLD.

    I'd like to point you to Ron Murray & Barbara Tillett's fabulous
    presentation from the CC:DA meeting at ALA's 2010 Conference:
    http://www.slideshare.net/RonMurray/from-mobydick-to-mashups

    It's extremely dense, and I highly recommend reading the whole thing
    because it really explores the RDA/RDF cataloging problem space, but there
    are a few places where they make some extremely important observations...

    Slide 14-34

    In which they point out that the _original_ FRBR conceptual model was
    intended to be a network graph, not a hierarchy, concluding with...
    "Why is there an expectation of -- or insistence upon -- hierarchies in
    the FRBR conceptual model?"

    Slide 63-80 (especially 68-78)

    In which they show that the FRBR 'entities' can more usefully be
    considered as "Resource Description Levels" that can be "differentiated
    by degree of abstraction"

    Slide 150 and on... "Managing Simplicity and Complexity:Description &
    Relationship Growth" "An aggregate of resources and their descriptions
    may grow over time"

    The fundamental problem with both of the widely accepted FRBRer and
    FRBRoop models is their reliance on an entity data model that distorts the
    ability to see a FRBR resource description as an aggregate of properties
    "differentiated by degree of abstraction". We need to move beyond the
    notion of discrete records and entities.

    If you're creating and managing metadata, then it's highly useful to have
    that data described by an entity-based schema so you can build forms and
    normalize. And the FRBRer and FRBRoop models are reasonably good for that.
    But when you're distributing and aggregating that metadata as RDF data on
    the open web, they're too restrictive and the original FRBRgraph model
    becomes not just more useful, but essential. And if you want to bring
    aggregated LLD FRBR metadata into a system that has hierarchic FRBRer
    requirements, then you make a decision for _your_ system about what to
    do with missing parts of the hierarchy. You might even take the various
    properties and reassign them to different 'levels'. That's what the
    'open' RDA superproperties are explicitly intended to support.

    We have often made the mistake of trying to define a one-size-fits-all
    data model that covers data creation, management, publication, and
    aggregation.  Data creation and management work quite well for the XML
    hierarchical model but that model creates significant challenges for
    distribution and aggregation. The RDF graph model excels at knowledge
    transfer, publication, and aggregation but stinks for data creation and
    management. We need to make sure that we're using the best model for
    the job and keep in mind the significant differences between the two.

-- 
Tom Baker <tbaker@tbaker.de>

Received on Sunday, 13 March 2011 23:41:08 UTC