RE: Options we have with respect to the draft charters (i.e., RE: [fwd] Draft charters for work on Semantics for WS)

I'd like to make clear about my statement regarding XML, RDF/OWL, semantic
Web, etc. XML is based on a Tree model while RDF is based on a graphic model
originated from the AI domain. Thus it's not easy for XML people to
understand RDF tripples. 

Since semantic Web is a "logical Web", in this sense, the
"machine-processible semantics" as Uschold discuessed is limited to those
"logics". However, the content of "semantics" is far more than "logics".
That's why Veltman criticized the SW technologies as it is an obvious
problem as how can we use RDF/OWL to describe the semantics of Culture or
literature when people exchange information over the Internet? Actually what
machine can process depends on how people design the procedure, which may
have no logics inside it.

As for semantic Web services, RDF is good at define the class-subclass
relationship and thus has a root relationship with object-oriented
programming techniques. However, in Web services, we have much more
relatsionships than the class-subclass relation as we have to define the
meaning, purpose, behavior, etc. of the services and functions, which may be
all beyond the WSDL document itself. 



-----Original Message-----
From: Bijan Parsia
To: jeff@inf.ed.ac.uk
Cc: public-sws-ig@w3.org
Sent: 11/22/05 9:06 AM
Subject: Re: Options we have with respect to the draft charters (i.e., RE:
[fwd]  Draft charters for work on Semantics for WS)


On Nov 21, 2005, at 10:24 PM, jeff@inf.ed.ac.uk wrote:

> Quoting Bijan Parsia <bparsia@isr.umd.edu>:
>
>> On Nov 21, 2005, at 7:21 PM, jeff@inf.ed.ac.uk wrote:
>>
>>> Quoting Bijan Parsia <bparsia@isr.umd.edu>:
[snip]

Perhaps we should take this off list.

> In context, the complexity point was:
>
>   even XML people cannot understand RDF/OWL due to those logics
>   and the way of RDF presentation. That's why this technology is
>   not well accepted and deployed.   That's why I said here before,
>   the more complex the system, the less the user. It's the same
>   to developing semantic Web services.
>
> For people trying to understand, and making decisions about
> adopting, RDF/OWL can be significantly more complex in the
> ways that most affect their decision.

But he didn't make this claim. Acutally, he made a muddle of claims (is 
it that RDF & OWL are a logic, or that they have bad presentation?) So, 
there's the claim that it *is* more complex and *why* it is more 
complex. Then the simple claim that *any* complexity reduces the number 
of users. So I believe you are reading far more into what he wrote.

And complex *for what*? Are we comparing relevantly similar tasks? (For 
example.) Perhaps we should look at the relative acceptance of Relax NG 
and XML Schema?

I had written a lot more, but it doesn't seem worth it. I stand by my 
point that wild-eyed bashing is no more informative than wild-eyed 
hype, and that if you are going to talk about the acceptance dimishing 
effects of complexity, you have to be fairly sophisticated in your 
discussion. Acceptance and adoption are complex things which marketers, 
economists and psychologists spend a lot of time failing to accurately 
predict. I think we should be humble in our claims.

Cheers,
Bijan.

Received on Tuesday, 22 November 2005 15:17:54 UTC