- From: Sean B. Palmer <sean@mysterylights.com>
- Date: Wed, 2 Jan 2002 18:34:45 -0000
- To: <www-archive@w3.org>
Recipie:-
* GET http://infomesh.net/2001/enquire/manual/
* Excerpt page 2
* s/ENQUIRE/RDF/
Result:-
[[[
3. Modular Structure in general: Circles and Arrows
The assumption is made that the system to be described can be
broken up into "modules". It is generally accepted that this is a
necessity for any modifyable or maintainable system involving
computers. No assumptions are made about how the breaking up is done
-- RDF imposes no constraints on the high level design.
A similar way of describing a structure is to draw, on a piece of
paper, circles with arrows in between. The circles ("modules") could
be programs or pieces of hardware, for instance, and the arrows could
mean "passes data to", "is composed of", or "is started by". This
method, with a variety of different shaped boxes, and different
coloured arrows, is useful, clear, and commonly used. The RDF
system allows a more complicated system to be described than would fit
on a piece of paper. It than allows an interactive user to explore
the system in search of the information he requires, seeing only the
parts which are of interest.
RDF divides both the modules (circles) and relationships
(arrows) into broad categories. This makes it easier to analyse the
structure you end up with. For instance the realtionships "is part
of" and "includes" show the division of a module into smaller modules.
Also, when altering one part of the system, it is useful to know by
which other parts it is used. These are generalised reletionships,
just as Document, Program, Machine are generalised types of module.
The modules may be all sorts of things. They are referred to below
as "nodes", because of the role they take in the network of
interrelationships within the system.
]]]
Cheers,
--
Kindest Regards,
Sean B. Palmer
@prefix : <http://purl.org/net/swn#> .
:Sean :homepage <http://purl.org/net/sbp/> .
Received on Wednesday, 2 January 2002 13:34:57 UTC