RE: References to "application profiles"

I'm comfortable with the diff. Thanks Antoine.

Jeff

> -----Original Message-----
> From: public-xg-lld-request@w3.org [mailto:public-xg-lld-
> request@w3.org] On Behalf Of Antoine Isaac
> Sent: Sunday, August 28, 2011 10:07 AM
> To: public-xg-lld@w3.org
> Subject: Re: References to "application profiles"
> 
> Hi everyone,
> 
> It seemed difficult to extract a consensus from the thread :-)
> Anyway I've tried:
>
http://www.w3.org/2005/Incubator/lld/wiki/index.php?title=Draft_Vocabul
> aries_Datasets_Section2&diff=6006&oldid=5906
> 
> As APs are already mentioned in this section (and I understand Tom
> would add them in other parts of the report) I have removed them from
> the debatable sentence. And I've tried to make my "gradation" more
> explicit, while not presenting it as a formal framework.
> Btw "alignments" do indeed include ontology mappings as expressed in
> OWL, clearly.
> 
> Cheers,
> 
> Antoine
> 
> 
> > Quoting "Young,Jeff (OR)" <jyoung@oclc.org>:
> >
> >
> >> I'm uncomfortable using the term AP even for situations where a
> variety
> >> of existing classes and properties are getting reused. An OWL
> ontology
> >> can be created to document this situation, even if no new terms are
> >> being defined there.
> >
> > I agree with Jeff here. It seems that AP is being used for any
> ontology that uses a mix of namespaces or that adopts properties from
> existing namespaces. This seems to me to be normal practice for
> ontology development. At what point does a choice of properties become
> an AP? In DC terms, I think that it becomes an AP only when
constraints
> are added (mandatory, optional, repeatable or not, etc.).
> >
> > I commonly hear people use the term AP when someone consciously
> creates a personalized or modified version of a known metadata schema.
> So a sub-set of, say, MARC that selects out the fields needed to
encode
> music resources but not cartographic resources would be an AP in this
> definition.
> >
> > Basically, I think we don't have a clear enough definition of AP to
> use the term in this report without going through a lengthy discussion
> that would allow us to make it clear. I'd prefer to leave it out, but
> think that the concept is important and definitely needs more thought.
> >
> > kc
> >
> >> Granted, you don't see much of that happening yet,
> >> but presumably that's presumably because people are still trying to
> wrap
> >> their minds around OWL in general.
> >>
> >>> But there are many situations in which re-using a
> >>> vocabulary comes with risks/costs that could motivate coining
one's
> >> own
> >>> "duplicate" elements. Consider what schema.org did: they just
> prefered
> >>> to coin all the elements they need, rather than spend time
shopping
> >>> around for existing elements--which may be not well maintained
> anyway.
> >>> That's maybe not the best practice around, but that will continue
> to
> >>> happen. In such cases, establishing alignments between element
sets
> is
> >>> a lesser evil.
> >>
> >> As a species, I think we are still beginners in terms of modular
> >> thinking. I can't think of a single existing model or set of models
> that
> >> doesn't make me squirm and shake. "Alignments" or "mappings" give
me
> >> hope that we will be able to adapt regardless.
> >>
> >>>
> >>> The "gradient" of best practice here would be: (1) own duplicate
> >>> element sets with no alignment; (2) own element sets with
alignment
> to
> >>> existing vocabularies (3) "true" APs with re-use of existing
> >>> vocabularies.
> >>
> >> I agree with these idealized gradients with a couple of caveats.
> >>
> >> 1) Existing vocabularies that don't conform to best practice
recipes
> >> suck: http://www.w3.org/TR/swbp-vocab-pub/
> >> 2) Some existing vocabularies (even popular ones) can be very weird
> and
> >> arguably would be better off being mapped
> >> 3) The ability to transform domain-specific vocabularies into
> foreign
> >> vocabularies shouldn't be that far off if the mappings exist
> >>
> >>>
> >>> I'm not saying that it was clearly worded here, far from it :-)
> >>> I can also live with this point being mentioned in another
section.
> >> But
> >>> I wanted to warn against making this disappear, altogether.
> >>
> >> I suspect that all these thoughts are too controversial to used on
> short
> >> notice, though.
> >>
> >> Jeff
> >>
> >>>
> >>> Cheers,
> >>>
> >>> Antoine
> >>>
> >>> > Dear all,
> >>> >
> >>> > Re-reading the paragraph in [1]:
> >>> >
> >>> > A similar concern can be voiced regarding metadata element
> >> sets.
> >>> As
> >>> > testified in the Linked Open Vocabularies inventory,
> >>> practitioners
> >>> > generally follow the good practice of re-using existing element
> >>> sets or
> >>> > building "application profiles" of them. And some projects,
> >> such
> >>> as the
> >>> > Vocabulary Mapping Framework, aim at supporting that process.
> >>> But the lack
> >>> > of long-term support for them threatens their enduring meaning
> >>> and common
> >>> > understanding. Further, some reference frameworks, notably
> >> FRBR,
> >>> have been
> >>> > implemented in different RDF vocabularies, which are not always
> >>> connected
> >>> > together. Such situation lowers the semantic interoperability
> >> of
> >>> the
> >>> > datasets expressed using these RDF vocabularies. The community
> >>> should
> >>> > encourage the coordinated re-use of element sets for particular
> >>> entity
> >>> > descriptions, their extension through, e.g., application
> >>> profiles, or their
> >>> > alignment using, e.g., semantic relations from RDFS and OWL.
> >>> Here, we hope
> >>> > that better communication between the creators and maintainers
> >>> of these
> >>> > resources, as encouraged by our own incubator group or the LOD-
> >>> LAM
> >>> > initiative, will help to consolidate the conceptual connections
> >>> between
> >>> > them.
> >>> >
> >>> > ...where "a similar concern" refers to "semantic links across
> value
> >>> vocabularies".
> >>> >
> >>> > Looking closer:
> >>> >
> >>> >> A similar concern can be voiced regarding metadata element
sets.
> As
> >>> >> testified in the Linked Open Vocabularies inventory,
> practitioners
> >>> >> generally follow the good practice of re-using existing element
> >> sets
> >>> or
> >>> >> building "application profiles" of them.
> >>> >
> >>> > If we mean Dublin-Core-style application profiles (as Singapore
> >>> Framework is
> >>> > cited further on in the paragraph), then we could say something
> >> like:
> >>> >
> >>> > A similar concern can be voiced regarding metadata element
> >>> sets. As
> >>> > testified in the Linked Open Vocabularies inventory,
> >>> practitioners
> >>> > generally follow the good practice of re-using existing
> >> element
> >>> sets or
> >>> > building "application profiles" that re-use elements from
> >>> multiple sets.
> >>> >
> >>> > Then, I do not really understand the first part of this
sentence:
> >>> >
> >>> >> The community should encourage the coordinated re-use of
element
> >>> sets for
> >>> >> particular entity descriptions, their extension through, e.g.,
> >>> application
> >>> >> profiles, or their alignment using, e.g., semantic relations
> from
> >>> RDFS and
> >>> >> OWL.
> >>> >
> >>> > The phrase "encourage the coordinated re-use of element sets for
> >>> > particular entity descriptions" seems to be saying something
> like:
> >>> >
> >>> > ...promote the use of common patterns of mixing vocabularies
> >> for
> >>> > describing particular types of things.
> >>> >
> >>> > However, I do not think this reference to application profiles
> >> really
> >>> belongs
> >>> > in a section on alignment.
> >>> >
> >>> > Rather, I would like to propose the following:
> >>> >
> >>> > -- That the section "The linking issue" (vague, because the
whole
> >> LLD
> >>> XG report is
> >>> > arguably about a "linking issue") be renamed something like:
> >>> >
> >>> > Semantic alignment
> >>> >
> >>> > -- In this case, the first sentence -- "Many semantic links
> across
> >>> value
> >>> > vocabularies are already available..." -- could be preceded with
> >>> a definition
> >>> > along the lines of:
> >>> >
> >>> > "Alignments" are links between semantically equivalent,
> >>> similar, or
> >>> > related terms or entities across different value
> >>> vocabularies, metadata
> >>> > element sets, or datasets.
> >>> >
> >>> > -- The notion of application profiles is more appropriately
> >>> referenced in the point
> >>> > about re-using patterns:
> >>> >
> >>> > In the paragraph:
> >>> >
> >>> > Design patterns allow implementers to build on the experience
> >> of
> >>> > predecessors. Traditional cataloging practices are documented
> >>> with a rich
> >>> > array of patterns and examples, and best practices are starting
> >>> to be
> >>> > documented for the Linked Data space as a whole (e.g.,
> >>> > <ref>http://linkeddatabook.com/editions/1.0/#htoc61</ref>). [*]
> >>> What is needed
> >>> > are design patterns specifically tailored to LLD requirements.
> >>> Such design
> >>> > patterns would meet the needs of people and developers who
> >>> understand new
> >>> > techniques through patterns and examples and will increase the
> >>> coherence of
> >>> > Library Linked Data overall.
> >>> >
> >>> > I propose inserting a sentence:
> >>> >
> >>> > Application profiles
> >> (http://dublincore.org/documents/singapore-
> >>> framework/)
> >>> > provide a method for a community of practice to document and
> >>> share patterns
> >>> > used for describing specific types of materials.
> >>> >
> >>> > -- ...and application profiles are also relevant to "data
design"
> >>> [2]:
> >>> >
> >>> > Another boost for Linked Data is the growing use of OWL for
> >>> purposes of
> >>> > data design. Prior to OWL, domain experts could use RDFS to
> >>> create metadata
> >>> > element sets, but there was no way to map equivalencies across
> >>> > vocabularies. Among other features, OWL includes an upgrade to
> >>> RDFS to
> >>> > support ontology mapping. This allows experts to describe their
> >>> domain
> >>> > using community idioms, while still being interoperable with
> >>> related or
> >>> > more common idioms. A variety of tools related to OWL can be
> >>> found on the
> >>> > W3C's RDF wiki and OWL wiki. Unified Modeling Language (UML)
> >>> tools are also
> >>> > value to help designers represent and manipulate domain models
> >>> visually.
> >>> > The Ontology Definition Metamodel (ODM) specification should
> >>> help bridge
> >>> > some of the gaps between UML and OWL. [*]
> >>> >
> >>> > I propose to add:
> >>> >
> >>> > Application profiles
> >> (http://dublincore.org/documents/singapore-
> >>> framework/)
> >>> > provide a way to specify how a community of practice defines a
> >>> > domain model and re-uses specific vocabularies in order to
> >>> create metadata
> >>> > conforming to a particular pattern.
> >>> >
> >>> > Tom
> >>> >
> >>> > [1]
> >>>
> >>
>
http://www.w3.org/2005/Incubator/lld/wiki/DraftReportWithTransclusion#T
> >>> he_linking_issue
> >>> > [2]
> >>>
> >>
>
http://www.w3.org/2005/Incubator/lld/wiki/DraftReportWithTransclusion#T
> >>> ools_for_data_designers
> >>> > [3]
> >>>
> >>
>
http://www.w3.org/2005/Incubator/lld/wiki/DraftReportWithTransclusion#D
> >>> evelop_and_disseminate_best-
> practices_design_patterns_tailored_to_LLD
> >>> >
> >>> >
> >>>
> >>>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >>
> >
> >
> >
> 
>

Received on Sunday, 28 August 2011 15:12:57 UTC