RDFTM comments: Wood

This posting contains the editors' resolution of comments on the RDFTM
Survey posted by David Wood:
http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-swbp-wg/2005Mar/0026.html

When discussing specific issues, please use the issue ID as part of
the Subject: line.


* RDFTM-DW001: Accepted with comments
|
| I am not an expert in Topic Maps (and not really in RDF, either!).
| Please take my comments accordingly. It is important, though, that the
| document be accessible to both communities and not just to those with
| a complete understanding of both.

While it is clearly important that the document be accessible to both
communities, the target audience is quite narrow and was defined at the
Boston F2F as "specially interested parties" with "greater than passing
familiarity with both paradigms".[1] This will be stated clearly in the
document. The TF's second deliverable, on the other hand, will have a
much wider audience.


* RDFTM-DW002: Accepted with comments
|
| The document seems to focus on comparisons between RDF (and
| occasionally RDFS) to TMs. Has any work been done to add OWL to the
| comparisons? Would it be useful to do so? My rather naive thinking
| suggests that it may be.

As agreed at the Boston F2F, RDFS and OWL are in scope to the extent
that the classes and properties they define are supportive of data
interoperability. It is not a goal of the current work to enable the
general use of RDF Schema and OWL with Topic Maps. Text to this effect
has been added to the document.


* RDFTM-DW003: Accepted with comments
|
| Some of the referenced authors note that RDF and TM may not be
| directly mapped. Do the editors agree or disagree with that? After
| reading, I was left feeling that they had chosen not to say, while
| being optimistic. Is that the case?

It is the case that the editors are optimistic and this is now stated in
the conclusion of the document.


* RDFTM-DW004: Accepted
|
| The title really needs to change. "RDFTM" is an acronym used only
| internally by the SWBPD WG. I would suggest something like, "A Survey
| of RDF/Topic Map Interoperability Proposals".


* RDFTM-DW005: Accepted
|
| The W3C itself did not initiate the RDFTM task force, the SWPBD WG
| did. The WG should be named in the Status and Background sections.
| This is especially important since any Note coming from this work
| would be an SWBP document :) Similarly, the RDFTM TF itself should not
| be referenced in the document, since it is a transient part of the
| publishing WG.


* RDFTM-DW006: Accepted with comments
|
| I don't think that WG *intentions* should be put into Notes.
| Therefore, this document should not name future deliverables or refer
| to them. Ralph may suggest differently?

Ralph suggested using language such as "expects to".


* RDFTM-DW007: Accepted with comments
|
| There are some terms that are used and not defined first (such as
| RDFTM, RDF2TM, TM2RDF). They may be obvious to us, but we shouldn't
| assume that the average reader will find them understandable. Are the
| terms TM and XTM synonymous? They appear to be used that way, but I am
| not sure.

They are not synonymous. TM is short for Topic Maps, the name of the
standard, the paradigm and (lower-cased) the artifacts themselves. XTM
is the standard interchange syntax (XML Topic Maps). This is clarified
when mentioned XTM.


* RDFTM-DW008: Accepted with comments
|
| Under the Unibo description, the document says, "implemented in Meta".
| What is Meta? Is there a reference to it?

Meta is a tool implemented at the University of Bologna. It is discussed
in the referenced Unibo papers.


* RDFTM-DW009: Accepted with comments
|
| One should be very cautious when naming commercial products, even if
| they are relevant. I suggest that commercial products be named solely
| in references. We need to ensure that we do not appear to be endorsing
| any particular product, EVEN IF IT IS THE BEST THING OUT THERE.

At the Boston F2F it was decided that commercial implementations can be
treated in the same way as non-commercial implementations, but should be
mentioned sparingly, in context, and toward a specific purpose. Mentions
of commercial products has been significantly reduced.


* RDFTM-DW010: Accepted with comments
|
| There are several places where the document says that a particular
| feature is "not possible in RDF". I was confused by this in some
| places. RDF, RDFS or RDF/RDFS/OWL? Surely multiple options for a given
| label may be represented in RDF; what are the ramifications in
| relation to RDF/TM integration? I was left without an answer since the
| dismissal of the issue occurred to early.

All the proposals under consideration were published before the advent
of OWL. Quoted comments about the limitations of RDF should be viewed in
that light. A note has been added that this effect.


* RDFTM-DW011: Accepted with comments
|
| The Test Cases for each proposal are dense and take a lot of space.
| They are probably not (completely) accessible to those without a
| rather complete background in both RDF and TM. Perhaps these can be
| split out into separately-published URLs? Alternately, they could go
| into an appendix.

The Boston F2F left the decision to the discretion of the editors who
have simplified the test cases somewhat and decided to keep them in the
main document along with text that makes them more accessible.


* RDFTM-DW012: Accepted with comments
|
| It was not clear how the test results related to one another. I had to
| flip around a lot to get that overview. A summary table would help
| readability.

Comments have been added to the test results in order to make them more
accessible.


* RDFTM-DW013: Accepted
|
| The conclusion is reasonable and has the right content, but it might
| be nice to expound just a little bit (in spite of the length of the
| document).

[1] http://www.ontopia.net/work/survey-pres.html



--
Steve Pepper <pepper@ontopia.net>
Chief Strategy Officer, Ontopia
Convenor, ISO/IEC JTC 1/SC 34/WG 3
Editor, XTM (XML Topic Maps 1.0)

Received on Friday, 18 March 2005 14:27:00 UTC