Re: Taking an axe RDF in XML? (no thank you)

>>>>> "AP" == "Assini, Pasqualino" <of Thu, 23 May 2002 18:28:25 BST> writes:


    AP> regarding the use case point:

    AP> RDF can be very useful even without any logical inference.

    AP> My company, for example, uses it as part of an object-oriented
    AP> web services framework.

Yes, but is it really a use of RDF or a (simple) use of the old object-oriented
technology?
Could you do the same in WSDL or by serializing Java interface for that matter?

My point is that as long as RDF stays a mere language for expressing facts
there will be no big incentive to use it by a broader community.

A more convincing use of RDF (and by "RDF" I mean a broader language for
the semantic web) could be if your company had something like UDDI and WSDL
expressed in RDF. 
One could query the UDDI/RDF directory and determine (using some knowledge
and criteria) which of the many services to invoke. Then check the WSDL/RDF
piece and figure out how to invoke the service. If it could be demonstrated
that such a thing can be done very succinctly in the expanded RDF, I can
imagine that this might be an incentive.


    AP> Regarding the syntax point: 

    AP> I really like F-Logic but I wonder if we couldn't define something even
    AP> simpler that people without a strong technical background could feel
    AP> familiar with such as a pseudo-english syntax.

If you are talking about the language of facts then it is very simple and
no "technical background" is needed beyond a high school. I would think
that using N3 requires more "technical background" because of the anonymous
resource thingie.
If you want the user to actually program then yes, training is needed.
But this is true about any other language.

    AP> I am not thinking of natural language processing, just a simple
    AP> syntax that 
    AP> can be parsed with ordinary tools but that could be interpreted as
    AP> a simple 
    AP> form of human language.

    AP> Something like:

    AP> http://www.yahoo.com is a HomePage and its author is 'John Smith'.

    AP> Reification:
    AP> 'John Smith' says "http://www.yahoo.com is a HomePage".

There is a (big) difference between what a programmer (or a knowledge
engineer) needs and what a "naive" user can swallow. For a naive user
something like the above can be provided through a GUI -- a dumbed down 
fact language for representing facts. It is not a big deal to even design
an interface where such a user would be able to specify simple rules.

For a programmer/knowledge engineer, however, you don't want such an
interface.  This is one of the mistakes that was made by the designers of
SQL. (Jim Gray once said, "I designed it and I apologize". He wasn't
completely serious, but it wasn't a pure joke either.)



	regards
	  --michael

Received on Thursday, 23 May 2002 21:04:30 UTC