- From: Stella Dextre Clarke <sdclarke@lukehouse.demon.co.uk>
- Date: Tue, 24 May 2005 09:01:42 +0100
- To: "'Miles, AJ \(Alistair\)'" <A.J.Miles@rl.ac.uk>, <public-esw-thes@w3.org>
- Cc: <RichardN@sfwindows.co.uk>
- Message-ID: <000901c56036$d28a59f0$0300a8c0@DELL>
Not sure I've understood why this is a problem. What's wrong with the following course of action?: On the one hand, set up the thesaurus as a Namespace, available at all times over the Internet or intranet. Secondly, develop the XML schema below a little further, to include an element "tissue type" (or it could be "thesaurus term", if the schema is to be used more broadly than just for tissue types). Thirdly, when the schema is put to use, presumably a sample comes in, the appropriate values are added to each of the elements, including the one that will name the tissue type. The appropriate thesaurus term is filled in, say "spleen". The schema must include the full details that allow this to be connected up with the Namespace where this term may be found. Is something more complicated than this required? To me, sanity lies in keeping the thesaurus (with all its internal complications) completely separate from the application where terms from the thesaurus are going to be used - but still available for reference when needed. Stella ***************************************************** Stella Dextre Clarke Information Consultant Luke House, West Hendred, Wantage, Oxon, OX12 8RR, UK Tel: 01235-833-298 Fax: 01235-863-298 SDClarke@LukeHouse.demon.co.uk ***************************************************** -----Original Message----- From: public-esw-thes-request@w3.org [mailto:public-esw-thes-request@w3.org] On Behalf Of Miles, AJ (Alistair) Sent: 23 May 2005 18:32 To: public-esw-thes@w3.org Cc: RichardN@sfwindows.co.uk Subject: FW: XML schemas and thesauri question Further elaboration from Richard: -----Original Message----- From: RichardN [mailto:RichardN@sfwindows.co.uk] Sent: 23 May 2005 13:24 To: Miles, AJ (Alistair) Subject: RE: XML schemas and thesauri question Hello Alistair, Thank you for your reply. Apologies for not responding sooner; I have been out of the office for a couple of days. Let me see if I can give you a more specific example. Imagine a scientific lab is taking in samples of animal tissue for analysis. Each sample is a data entity with three data items (obviously in real life it would be more than that): an ID, a weight in grams, and a tissue type field. You could set up a schema to define your entity like this: <xs:schema version="1.0" xmlns:xs="http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema"> <xs:annotation> <xs:documentation>Tissue sample schema</xs:documentation> </xs:annotation> <xs:element name="sample"> <xs:annotation> <xs:documentation> Data entity for a tissue sample (simple example) </xs:documentation> </xs:annotation> <xs:complexType> <xs:attribute name="id" use="required"> <xs:annotation> <xs:documentation> identifier for this sample </xs:documentation> </xs:annotation> <xs:simpleType> <xs:restriction base="xs:integer"> <xs:minInclusive value="1" /> </xs:restriction> </xs:simpleType> </xs:attribute> <xs:sequence> <xs:element name="weight" minOccurs="0" maxOccurs="1"> <xs:annotation> <xs:documentation> Weight of the tissue sample in grams </xs:documentation> </xs:annotation> <xs:simpleType> <xs:restriction base="xs:integer"> <xs:minInclusive value="1" /> <xs:maxInclusive value="999" /> </xs:restriction> </xs:simpleType> </xs:element> <xs:element name="type" minOccurs="1" maxOccurs="1"> <xs:annotation> <xs:documentation> Type of the tissue sample </xs:documentation> </xs:annotation> <xs:simpleType> <xs:restriction base="xs:string"> <xs:minLength value="1" /> <xs:maxLength value="80" /> </xs:restriction> </xs:simpleType> </xs:element> </xs:sequence> </xs:complexType> </xs:element> </xs:schema> Now imagine there is a thesaurus with lots of terms covering the whole of veterinary science, but which contains the following hierarchy: animal anatomy NT1: (animal secretions, body fluids, excretions and exudates) NT1: animal organs NT2: animal glands NT2: brain NT2: gall bladder NT2: gills NT2: heart NT2: hepatopancreas NT2: kidneys NT2: liver NT2: lungs NT2: sense organs NT2: shell gland NT2: spleen NT2: sting apparatus NT2: stomach NT3: gastric fundus NT3: gastric mucosa NT3: pylorus NT3: ruminant stomach NT2: tonsils NT1: animal tissues NT2: animal tissue extracts NT2: basement membrane NT2: bone marrow NT2: cell membranes NT2: connective tissues NT2: epithelium NT2: gingiva NT2: imaginal discs NT2: laminae (animals) NT2: muscle tissues NT2: nerve tissue NT2: serosa NT1: circulatory system NT2: cardiovascular system NT2: hemolymph NT2: lymphatic system NT1: digestive system Etc. Each of these narrower terms has an extended hierarchy underneath it. The kind of requirement I am talking about is being able to say (for example): tissue sample type, which has been declared in the XML schema as a string between 1 and 80 characters in length, should be constrained to one of the thesaurus terms, either a narrower term of "animal organs" or a narrower term of "animal tissues". To do this, I guess, you would need to represent the thesaurus in some form of XML format (which is best?) and then the bit I don't see at all - declaring somewhere (in the XML schema?) that the tissue sample type data item should be constrained in the manner I explained. For added complication, you could add the rule - all narrower terms of "animal organs" or "animal tissues", EXCEPT "stomach" or any narrower term of "stomach". Does that make any sense? Thanks for any help you can provide me, Richard Richard Northedge SFW Ltd. _____ From: Miles, AJ (Alistair) [mailto:A.J.Miles@rl.ac.uk] Sent: 18 May 2005 17:41 To: RichardN Subject: RE: XML schemas and thesauri question Hi Richard, This is a very interesting use case! Can you give more details, more specific examples of the kinds of constraint you want to enforce? Cheers, Alistair. --- Alistair Miles Research Associate CCLRC - Rutherford Appleton Laboratory Building R1 Room 1.60 Fermi Avenue Chilton Didcot Oxfordshire OX11 0QX United Kingdom Email: a.j.miles@rl.ac.uk Tel: +44 (0)1235 445440 -----Original Message----- From: RichardN [mailto:RichardN@sfwindows.co.uk] Sent: 18 May 2005 15:00 To: Miles, AJ (Alistair) Subject: XML schemas and thesauri question Hello Alistair, I am one of Daniel Whymark's colleagues, and he mentioned to me that you might be able to help with an XML / semantic web type question that I have. To give you some indication of my current level of understanding: I am comfortable with XML and XML schemas, and have been reading up about semantic web concepts, but I don't have a strong grasp of any of the semantic web -type XML languages such as RDF, XML topic maps, OWL etc. I have come across SCOS, but that's about as far as it goes. We need to define a standard format for our data entities. The obvious way of doing this is to define the format using XML schemas. We also have an ISO 2788 style thesaurus with BT (broader term), NT (narrower term) etc. Some of the data items in the data entities should have their values restricted to a set of preferred terms in the thesaurus. For example, a data item might need to be restricted so that the set of allowable values includes the thesaurus term "United Kingdom" and all of the narrower terms belonging to the "United Kingdom" term. In some cases, it may be necessary to restrict the levels of narrower terms underneath the root term that are allowable. My question is: what is the best way of encoding the thesaurus in standards-compliant XML in such a way that it can be linked to the XML schemas, so that we can enforce the data item restrictions I have outlined? Any help you can give me would be much appreciated, Regards, Richard Richard Northedge SFW Ltd.
Received on Tuesday, 24 May 2005 08:01:41 UTC