Re: List Etiquette - It isn't really fair

Thanks Aidan, very generous of you.
And yes, it is difficult.

On 18 Apr 2013, at 16:41, Aidan Hogan <aidan.hogan@deri.org> wrote:

> Hugh, you are correct and I would like to apologise for my part in that as the main instigator.
> 
> On my side however, I found it difficult to see my statements deconstructed and rearranged into various positions I never took and that I very much disagree with [6], but yes, I still should have just stated my position as clearly as possible and left it at that (why I personally take exception to a claim like "SPARQL scales" is again covered by [1-5]).
> 
> On the plus side though, perhaps some interesting discussion has arisen out of this in various threads. (In particular, I found Leigh's comments very much constructive.)
> 
> /Aidan
> 
> 
> [1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scalability
> 
> [2] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tractable_problem
> 
> [3] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P-complete
> 
> [4] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Graph_homomorphism
> 
> [5] Jorge Pérez, Marcelo Arenas, Claudio Gutierrez: Semantics and
> complexity of SPARQL. ACM Trans. Database Syst. 34(3) (2009)
> 
> [6] "XPath can replace SPARQL" (I never said that), "XPath is better than SPARQL" (I said it was more scalable in the general case being tractable and parallelisable), "XYZ is scalable and can do what SPARQL does" (obviously nonsense if I hold that SPARQL doesn't scale in the general case), "because implementation X cannot do Y, this proves the SPARQL doesn't scale" (I never took this position; I was directly asked for /examples/ and I gave the simplest ones I could think of; the proof that SPARQL is not scalable [1-3] is in [5] above) ... and again, I do like SPARQL a lot and I'm personally not a fan of anything XML, let alone XPath. So now I'll shut up. :)
> 
> 
> On 18/04/2013 12:05, Kingsley Idehen wrote:
>> On 4/18/13 6:41 AM, Hugh Glaser wrote:
>>> Someone starts a thread (in this case Luca and his Restpark), about
>>> something they would like to get some feedback on.
>>> In the very first reply, an issue arises that is at best tangential to
>>> the thread subject, but (in my opinion) has no direct bearing on it:
>>> issues around "SPARQL scales?" and perhaps in comparison with REST, etc.
>>> 
>>> 40+ messages follow on "scaling", with the few on Restpark interspersed.
>>> Only the hardiest souls interested in Restpark would have combed
>>> through these messages to see the topic that interests them
>>> (or people who are retired with nothing better to do because they
>>> don't like gardening :-) )
>>> 
>>> This is no way to run a mailing list to get the widest engagement.
>>> It was clear very early (third message?) that the scaling topic had
>>> arisen - at that stage the discussion should have moved to a new
>>> thread on scaling;
>>> or simply changed the subject line to have "SPARQL Scaling - was
>>> Restpark - Minimal…".
>>> Then the people who might want to discuss Restpark can do so in their
>>> own thread, and the scaling people can have their thread, without
>>> being bothered by the Restpark discussion if they don't want to be.
>>> Simples!
>>> 
>>> I wouldn't bother, but this seems to be the normal way this lists
>>> works - check out the archive if you want!
>>> It makes it quite dysfunctional.
>>> 
>>> Note that I did not simply add this message to the Restpark thread,
>>> which is what usually happens in this list!
>>> 
>>> Best
>>> Hugh
>>> 
>>> 
>> Hugh,
>> 
>> The Restpark thread diverged for two presumptive reasons:
>> 
>> 1. REST and SPARQL are mutually exclusive
>> 2. Strawman on "scale" -- the simple point was supposed to be that
>> consensus and adoption are mercurial pursuits due to pattern explosion.
>> 
>> For the record, I have nothing about attempting to layer RESTful
>> interactions for simplified interactions with Linked Data. There will
>> never be a time when I am against options, even when I know the path to
>> consensus and adoption has a high probability of becoming an odyssey.
>> 
>> I few weeks ago a similar discussion emerged on Twitter, without the
>> unfortunate "mutual exclusion" undertone, and a conversation developed
>> progressed to the point were we  concluded that a post to this forum be
>> a nice route for seeking collaborators [1][2].
>> 
>> That all said, I should have forked the thread (with a new topic
>> heading) the moment the context for my use of "scale" was misunderstood.
>> 
>> 
>> Links:
>> 
>> 1. https://twitter.com/stephanef/status/317650285470298112 -- a thread
>> about RESTful patterns for working with ontologies and vocabularies
>> 2. https://twitter.com/kidehen/status/317661048486363138 -- scheduled
>> for implementation acknowledgement.
>> 
> 
>

Received on Thursday, 18 April 2013 21:26:49 UTC