Methodology: was Re: Issue 3 - Trust Mechanisms in OCLC Authority Control Service

Thanks Mark, that helps.

> In addition, we have the overarching problem that often the solutions we are
> talking about haven't been demonstrated. For example there are papers that
> discuss how to use the Semantic Web for interoperation between schemas or
> supporting a Web of Trust, but I can't download a piece of software that
> demonstrates how this would work. In fact, it is not clear in some cases if
> software has been written or whether the reports are speculative.

I think that gets to heart of my question and helps to answer it. This implies
that the goal is primarily to find specific solutions to the dspace-related
problems. Thus if a use case can be adequately solved by some existing piece of
technology then that is good, and Simile should employ that technology and build
a solution from it. Hence it is appropriate that your next stage is a series of
short prototyping activities to de-risk the technologies, with the implication
that you should use the less risky solutions.

Makes sense.

[The alternative answer, which at one time I thought might be part of the
motivation for Simile, would be to focus on researching new technology inspired
by the questions and constraints derived from the use cases. With that viewpoint
areas like "schema interoperation" or "web of trust" are interesting precisely
because they are high risk research topics - yet if they could be made to work
would have applications far outside the bounds of the initial use cases. Indeed,
from this viewpoint, if a use case is found to be solvable with existing
technology, at low risk, it would cease to be one that Simile should invest in.]

Dave

Received on Tuesday, 27 May 2003 13:29:53 UTC