Wanting focus on the bigger picture...

I've followed the discussion here for a few days.  Although I appreciate the
kind of granularity with which details are discussed here, I'm a little lost
as far as the possible paths this technology will take.  I've read some
FAQs, and some publications, including this month's Sciam release, so I'm
not completely clueless...  

My question is:  how will this impact the user experience.  What are the use
cases for this technology as it applies to search engines and / or agents.
I have yet to see a detailed, step by step sequence defined about how a user
will instruct an agent to perform a task, the kind of user interface that
could be provided, and how this interface will be defined.  Similarly, what
kinds of interfaces will software systems provide each other?  I realize
that there are existing resources out there that descibe this, so please
point the way if this is the case.

I can see something like:

*	User wants to buy a ticket to see a MLB game.
*	User turns to their Agent application, which provides an interface
based on its current ontology set
*	User selects "purchase", which automatically changes the UI to
conform to their preferred ontology for purchasing goods and services
*	User selects ticket, which causes relations between ticket and
ticket types to be queried
*	User selects MLB game, which causes relations between ballparks,
teams, and games to be queried
*	User is informed that tickets may be purchased direct from
park/team, or from private individuals
*	User selects the game, date, and seating arrangement desired, and
indicates that they will buy from either a private individual or vendor
depending on lowest price and closest seating arrangment.  Preference is
given to seating.
*	User is informed when the purchase has been made.  
*	Tickets delivered, User goes to game

Every step in the sequence provides the user with a new interface that is
generated from the available metadata on the step the user is engaged in.
Ontological servers would each support their own set of metadata about a
given subject/activity/topic, and most often will serve a specific genre of
data.  Ontological servers can also be grouped into trusted organizations,
either by peer or by client.

Am I off base here?  Are there more possibilities?  What are the methods for
discovery, and how would the RDF and other desciption files be structured
for the sequence detailed above?  How could interaces be generated from
metadata?  I'm curious about how members of this group envision that this
all fits together, and would be delighted by a response if you have time.

From what I understand, I see this as one of the most exciting frontiers of
research and development in technology.  What is done here could change
everything, combining the predicate based systems with knowledge discovery
and negotiation ala the WWW.

I thank you for your time and patience in advance.

Regards,

Julian

Received on Thursday, 26 April 2001 14:55:29 UTC