Re: A few lessons I have learned (June, '03)

right, dunno where to insert; learned from DanC et all

Data that isn't consumed rots.
Give my data back!
Model only those distinctions that you can exploit.

--
Jos De Roo, AGFA http://www.agfa.com/w3c/jdroo/


                                                                                                                          
                    "Roger L. Costello"                                                                                   
                    <costello@mitre.org>        To:     www-rdf-interest@w3.org                                           
                    Sent by:                    cc:     "Costello,Roger L." <costello@mitre.org>                          
                    www-rdf-interest-requ       Subject:     A few lessons I have learned (June, '03)                     
                    est@w3.org                                                                                            
                                                                                                                          
                                                                                                                          
                    2003-06-06 09:46 PM                                                                                   
                                                                                                                          
                                                                                                                          





Hi Folks,

Below are a few principles which I hold to be true:

1. Frequently, data endures but the applications which processes the
data comes and goes.

2. Separate everything:

   - separate data from presentation
   - separate data from applications that process the data
   - separate semantic definitions from application code
   - separate hyperlink definitions from data (put hyperlink
     definitions in a linkbase)

2. Freedom is not "do anything you want".  That is chaos.  Unbridled XML
leads to chaos.  Freedom is brought about through discipline.  Bring
order to instance data by conforming to a design pattern.

    The RDF Class/Property/Value design pattern seems like a
    good choice to control the chaos.

3. Minimize exacting requirements on the *form* of instance documents.
Expect diversity of expression.

    Corollary: In designing schemas apply liberal quantities
               of <any> and <all>; minimize use of <sequence>
               and minOccurs="1".

4. Take a step forward to machine understanding of instance data by
documenting how the data relates to other things in the world: How does
the class of data in the instance document relate to other classes of
data? What are the characteristics of the properties?  Answers to these
questions constitute a logical model.

    OWL seems like a good choice for declaratively expressing
    logical models.

I invite your suggestions for deletions/extensions/modifications to this
list. /Roger

Received on Friday, 6 June 2003 16:01:06 UTC