Re: Important Question re. WebID Verifiers & Linked Data

Hi,
it seems the discussion has after some months turned back to my main
concern regarding WebID.
In my eyes the decision about the required supported formats should be
founded on pragmaticism, choosing an option which would spur the most
adoption.
The choice is on what side of the WebID communication is to be the
easiest to implement and support - the consuming or the publishing side.
Requiring multitude of formats aids publishing but makes consuming more
complicated. My opinion on this is that consuming side is more
important, because it helps to resolve the chicken and egg problem of
adoption, which I realized seeing Semantic Web and RDF adoption crawl
for the past 10 years, but you may or may not agree with me on this and
that is fine.
There are 2 extreme positions which one can take on this decision -
require 1 format, or on the other hand require them all / not require
them at all. I don't think it makes sense to take some middle ground on
this problem, because it will motivate people to make competing
specification (I know because I would be), or even reinvent whole WebID
and force feeding people to accept few Linked Data formats doesn't make
them Linked Data aware and use its benefits.
No middle ground is fine, because already months before someone came up
with a solution - take BOTH positions: let the WebID core specification
be abstract, based on Linked Data ideal, not requiring specific format,
then have a separate specification aimed at interoperability and
adoption, specifying restrictions such as the one required format,
suitable for "supports XYZ" badges.

Best,
Jiri


On 12/22/2011 04:42 PM, Kingsley Idehen wrote:
> On 12/22/11 9:57 AM, Patrick Logan wrote:
>> OK, that seems manageable, assuming it all specs out.
>>
>> So looking at the 12 December 2012 draft (
>> http://www.w3.org/2005/Incubator/webid/spec/#in-portable-contacts-format-using-grddl
>>
>> ), it looks like (2) RDFa and (4) RDF/XML are in the draft, but (1)
>> HTML+Microdata and (3) Turtle are not.
>>
>> In particular the two most relevant sections look to be:
>>
>> ========
>> 3.2.4.1 Processing the WebID Profile
>>
>> The Verification Agent must be able to process documents in RDF/XML
>> [RDF-SYNTAX-GRAMMAR] and RDFa in XHTML [XHTML-RDFA]. The result of
>> this processing should be a graph of RDF relations that is queryable,
>> as explained in the next section.
>> ========
>>
>> How should that read instead?
> 
> ========
> 3.2.4.1 Processing the WebID Profile
> 
> The Verification Agent SHOULD be able to process at least one of the
> following structured documents types: RDF/XML
> [RDF-SYNTAX-GRAMMAR], RDFa in XHTML [XHTML-RDFA] or HTML, Turtle, and
> Microdata in HTML. The result of
> this processing should be a graph of RDF relations that is queryable,
> as explained in the next section.
> ========
> 
> 
>> And then the profile description section itself (
>> http://www.w3.org/2005/Incubator/webid/spec/#the-webid-profile ) lists
>> some "should", "must", and "not required"
>>
>> ========
>> foaf:mbox
>>
>> foaf:name
>>
>> foaf:depiction
>>
>> cert:RSAPublicKey
>>
>> cert:key
>> ========
>>
>> Clearly (to me) Turtle can handle these.
> 
> Yes, ditto Microdata.
> 
>> So maybe nothing more has to
>> be said about that but to list Turtle as an option.
>>
>> I know almost nothing about HTML+Microdata. My basic understanding is
>> that the "itemtype" attribute would be required to indicate some
>> values are foaf:mbox's, cert:key's, etc. Are there any representation
>> issues or pieces missing in the Microdata draft necessary to have
>> Microdata be unambiguously supported in the WebID spec?
>>
>> Are you (Kingsley) driving the inclusion of Microdata in the WebID spec?
> 
> I am suggesting it be added. There's no reason to not give Microdata and
> RDFa equal standing.  Microdata is already more widely used than RDFa,
> courtesy of Google's influence. Thus, why not embrace it?
> 
> Links:
> 
> 1. https://plus.google.com/112399767740508618350/posts -- note about
> Microdata and WebID .
> 
> Kingsley
>>
>> Thanks
>> -Patrick
>>
>>
>> On Thu, Dec 22, 2011 at 5:23 AM, Kingsley
>> Idehen<kidehen@openlinksw.com>  wrote:
>>> On 12/22/11 8:08 AM, Patrick Logan wrote:
>>>>> On Wed, Dec 21, 2011 at 7:42 PM, Kingsley
>>>>> Idehen<kidehen@openlinksw.com>
>>>>>   wrote:
>>>>>> The WebID spec can require or suggest a number of common formats for
>>>>>> eav/spo triple transmission as the basis for effective bootstrap.
>>>> Agreed. What should that list be at this point in time?
>>>>
>>>> -Patrick
>>>>
>>>>
>>> 1. HTML + Microdata
>>> 2. XHTML + RDFa
>>> 3. Turtle
>>> 4. RDF/XML .
>>>
>>> -- 
>>>
>>> Regards,
>>>
>>> Kingsley Idehen
>>> Founder&    CEO
>>>
>>> OpenLink Software
>>> Company Web: http://www.openlinksw.com
>>> Personal Weblog: http://www.openlinksw.com/blog/~kidehen
>>> Twitter/Identi.ca handle: @kidehen
>>> Google+ Profile: https://plus.google.com/112399767740508618350/about
>>> LinkedIn Profile: http://www.linkedin.com/in/kidehen
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>>
>>
> 
>