[VM] Telecon - some talking points

Vocabulary Management telecon - talking points

The purpose of this call will be to compare the original
draft VM note ("Draft 1" [1]) with a second strawman draft
focusing on RDF vocabularies ("Draft 2" [2]).

As one basis for discussion, the main differences:

1) Draft 1 feels like a fifteen-pager.  Draft 2 feels like
   a five-pager.

2) Draft 1 is called "Managing a Vocabulary for the Semantic
   Web".  Draft 2 is limited to "Basic Principles for Managing
   an RDF Vocabulary".

3) Draft 1 has placeholder text for some general discussion of
   how vocabularies are used in the Semantic Web.  Draft 2
   dispenses with this and cuts to the chase.

4) Draft 1 plans for a thread on OASIS Published Subjects.
   In Draft 2, they are out of scope.

5) Draft 1 describes PRISM.

6) Draft 1 cites several W3C documents about design principles
   in general and URIs in particular [3,4,5,6].

7) Draft 1 "bootstraps" the discussion by providing some simple
   definitions (e.g., "Term: A named concept.  Vocabulary: A set
   of terms.").

8) Drafts 1 and 2 articulate pretty much the same set of
   principles, albeit in different styles: one using single
   keywords and one using short sentences:
   Draft 2         Draft 1
   Naming          Identify Terms with URI References
   Documentation   Provide Documentation
   Maintenance     Articulate your Maintenance Policies
   Versioning      Identify Versions
   Publication     Publish a Formal Schema

9) After articulating the basic principles, Draft 2 simply 
   ends.  Draft 1 has a third section tentatively called
   "Questions on the Bleeding Edge" -- areas where practice
   is less clear or still evolving.  These are:

   a) Dereferencing URIs - What should the URI of a 
      vocabulary or term resolve to when someone "clicks
      on it" in a browser?
   b) Choice of Schema Language
   c) Reusing, Adapting, and Mixing Vocabularies
   d) Coining New Terms
   e) Vocabulary Ownership - the tension between the meaning 
      intended by a speaker and meaning as interpreted or 
      imposed by others.
   f) Maintaining Big Vocabularies
   g) What is a "namespace"?  What is a "term"?  (Discussion
      of ambiguities in the use of jargon.)

10) Neither Draft 1 nor Draft 2 discusses "hash versus slash",
    though the first principle ("Naming", or "Identify Terms
    with URI References") would provide examples of both types.
    This issue is touched on in another draft for the VM Task
    Force, "Some Things That Hashless HTTP URIs Can Name" [7].

[1] http://esw.w3.org/topic/VocabManagementNote
[2] http://lists.w3.org/Archives/Public/public-swbp-wg/2005May/0030.html
[3] Architecture of the World Wide Web
    http://www.w3.org/TR/2004/REC-webarch-20041215/
[4] Design Issues 
    http://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/
[5] Cool URIs don't change
    http://www.w3.org/Provider/Style/URI.html
[6] What do HTTP URIs identify?
    http://www.w3.org/DesignIssues/HTTP-URI.html
[7] Some Things That Hashless HTTP URIs Can Name,
    http://www.w3.org/2001/sw/BestPractices/VM/httpclass/1

-- 
Dr. Thomas Baker                        Thomas.Baker@izb.fraunhofer.de
Institutszentrum Schloss Birlinghoven         mobile +49-160-9664-2129
Fraunhofer-Gesellschaft                          work +49-30-8109-9027
53754 Sankt Augustin, Germany                    fax +49-2241-144-2352
Personal email: thbaker79@alumni.amherst.edu

Received on Thursday, 12 May 2005 16:26:01 UTC