Hydra Status

Hiya,

I'm primarily interested in using Hydra for an API that deals with
underlying IIIF (http://iiif.io) entities that are natively represented in
JSON-LD. The IIIF standard uses JSON-LD and does not assume that the data
is a serialisation of RDF. I think this is because many developers are used
to dealing with JSON and will be unfamiliar with RDF, so the decision was
taken to be JSON-LD-first for the IIIF formats in order to encourage
take-up. I personally have little interest in RDF and am happy to use
JSON-LD at face value in Hydra, an advantage being that it has zero
dissonance with the representation that IIIF uses.

Although I can see how a knowledge of RDF is useful for designing certain
parts of the framework, I think that emphasising RDF throughout would turn
many developers away - many would instead probably use something like
Swagger since it is A) fashionable and B) has no weight of expectation of
the underlying model. For example, being able to consume and use a Hydra
API from a piece of JavaScript that doesn't have to know anything about
graphs or RDF is a virtue from my point of view.

Adam.


-----Original Message-----
From: Markus Lanthaler [mailto:markus.lanthaler@gmx.net]
Sent: 16 November 2016 20:13
To: 'Hydra' <public-hydra@w3.org>
Subject: RE: Hydra Status

On 15 Nov 2016 at 23:28, Graham Conzett wrote:
> After this discussion I'm even less clear on who the intended audience
> is for Hydra is. Only people who are primarily focused on RDF?

We want to build something which is usable by everyone.. also people
without RDF background. But people working on the design of Hydra itself
need to be familiar with (or willing to learn the basics of) RDF and other
technologies Hydra is based on. Otherwise experience has shown that
constructive discussions are very difficult.

This doesn't mean people without background in those technologies and
without time to learn them can't participate. We will need input, use
cases, feedback etc. People without RDF background are crucial to ensure we
built something approachable to everyone and eventually document it in an
accessible manner.

Thoughts? Opinions? Objections anyone?


--
Markus Lanthaler
@markuslanthaler




> On Tue, Nov 15, 2016 at 4:19 PM, Ruben Verborgh <Ruben.Verborgh@ugent.be>
wrote:
>>> What I think we are sorely missing at the moment, is a group of
>>> *dedicated and
> committed* core contributors that push the development of Hydra forward.
>>
>> Count me in!
>>
>> Also, we'll need a clear driving force IMHO, a committee of 1–3
>> people coordinating everything.
>>
>>> We can also revisit Hydra's overall architecture but I'm a bit
>>> skeptical about such an
> effort if we can't reach consensus on something as fundamental as
collections.
>>
>> That is precisely why we should revisit it.
>>
>> Ruben


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