Re: Hydra compared with JSON API, other specifications

Kingsley, Martynas

It seems that your messages stray from the discussion slightly ;)

January 12 2016 2:15 AM, "Kingsley Idehen" <kidehen@openlinksw.com> wrote: 
> On 1/11/16 6:11 PM, Martynas Jusevičius wrote:
> 
>> First thing I would say that RDF is just part of the graph database
>> trend. Google uses Knowledge Graph, Microsoft has Office Graph,
>> Facebook has Open Graph and GraphQL. And there is Neo4J and other
>> database providers which are growing steadily. RDF is the
>> best-standardized graph language, so it gets attention whenever graph
>> data gets attention. Does someone still want to argue graph adoption?
>> 
>> In enterprise IT companies which are far from leading technically, the
>> problem is not the obscurity or esotericism of RDF or graphs however.
>> It is mismanagement and lack of vision. Left hand not knowing what the
>> right hand is doing, miscommunication, non-technical managers and
>> architectural astronauts, dozens of non-integrated products with
>> overlapping functionality, decades old legacy code and and frameworks
>> piled on one each other, rush for more features at the cost of
>> technical debt, etc. etc. The R&D department might actually be
>> developing something interesting while the management never looks at
>> it or chooses to ignore it.
>> 
>> RDF is not for those guys. It is so flexible and simple that their
>> minds would not comprehend.

This is harsh, but quite true. However I don't think that RDF and other graph solutions are equal in this regard. Isn't RDF so much more? It's not just a graph data structure and it's where people stumble. And unfortunately it's not the best graph either. Think how cumbersome reification is. And that graphs are not a first class citizen in some areas. Alternatives do one thing and do it good, while RDF seems trying to be too many things at once.

>> 
>> And JSON(-LD) is a distraction. It's not what matters, it's just a
>> format among others, which happens to be well-supported in JavaScript.

It may be so but at the same time it is finally a piece of RDF stack, which gains some adoption. The fact it's "well-supported in JavaScript" is a good thing, because it seems more accessible to the average dev. From there organizations can discover what RDF really is. Other serializations are perceived as even less friendly. RDF/XML is the common scapegoat, but there are people who don't find Turtle all that great and readable either.

> 
> Yep!
> 
> All notations and serialization formats are distractions in regards to
> the power that RDF provides as a Data Definition Language. Sadly,
> notations and serialization formats have held RDF ransom for more than
> 15 years, amazing!
> 

I agree! Yet JSON-LD is best at introducing people to Linked Data and RDF as an extension. And technical documents on the subject have just built a wall of apparent "academicness" and complexity. Hence I voted for better examples in you poll.

Received on Tuesday, 12 January 2016 08:25:05 UTC