RE: Alternatives to XML for RDF?

> > XML is nice because it can be used with XML tools - XQuery,
> > Xforms, XSLT,
>
> For RDF, the use of XML does not actually invite the use
> of XML tools such as above, as they cannot be used
> effectively for arbitrary RDF/XML schemas.
>
> This is because there is an N:1 relation between RDF/XML
> instances and graphs. While one may work to normalize
> the RDF/XML in various ways, the effort to do so safely
> (per the RDF MT) is usally equal to or greater than
> parsing the RDF/XML into a graph, so why bother.
>
> Operating directly on RDF/XML is a bad idea. One should
> always deal with an RDF graph -- and once you've gotten
> to the graph, the XML is gone, and is no longer an issue.

I still like my idea of applying XSLT to an RDF/XML document to produce a
human readable XHTML version of the same data. Yes it does mean you have to
either place restrictions on the serialisation, and there are still plenty
of browsers who don't do XSLT transforms, but if the main target is a
machine and the restrictions on the serialisation are something you can live
with (and you can decide just what those restrictions are) then it's a nice
way of adding quick human-readability.

> I don't think there are many, if any, fans of RDF/XML.

Like Tigger, "I'm the only one!"

Received on Tuesday, 12 August 2003 07:51:27 UTC